Tuesday poem #443 : Carla Harris : my only options

 

hostage on the bus I pluck poems from street debris
the road ripples in each driver’s wake
concrete waves lap against each tire
beating for the pavement’s heart
ba-bum ba-bum, ba-bum ba-bum
I am tossed in clusters of passengers, unbound
and abandoned, eyes locked as I sway, the empty body
is a container, the container is whistling
from the smallest crack in the frame to rattle
like grandpa’s mint tin by the drivers seat
permission to open the container
to take and to close with breathless aspirations
to not disrupt the eye of any other controller
a rider who watches you or a driver, stiff
at the wheel I whisk past
to pour out on the street

assembling on my feet
the heels slam in combat
I storm sidewalks drilling forward
anger is one remaining act of power
a firm walk isn’t running away, a pulsing
stride never looks uncertain, it implies
focus, strong intentions are a costume
a cloak which makes men stop noticing you
repulsed by femme faces which focus or scowl
they skip stiff women for the sweet genteel
women who bruise like softened fruit.
Brisk and severe, I walk going nowhere.
I walk to hear my anger hit the pavement, to snap
twigs and clear paths I race to pluck each street
out of another victims future poems
my holed soles hide unnoticed, until rain starts to fall
and quicker than the drops can soak into my canvass shoes,
my soles already draw standing water from the street.

 

  

 

Carla Harris is a disabled queer writer, performer and interdisciplinary artist from Treaty 4 territory, living in Regina Saskatchewan. She is currently working on her first collection of creative nonfiction poetry.

the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan