"Languages sputter over bus advertisements"
Michael Rerick

Languages sputter over bus advertisements. Languages sputter in waiting rooms and plants react. In any given space purple wig dangle catches the eye but to show surprise and appreciation ruins the effect. More often than not someone picks up a fallen crutch, moves to a seat further back, hands back a misplaced book, holds a door, but touch is taboo. As a culture we are preparing for long space flight with our prolonged interiors and hand sanitizers. My hands touch the keys in a sincere Facebook status update that reads a drunken “Happy Holidays.” When a house feels a heavy wind, we feel it too. The bottled water fetish—all bottled, a Coke a Red Bull a Full Sail a Lipton—makes sense because of the intimacy of liquid and the kiss of a rim. My French is nearly all navigated away. I take our obesity and give it proper names: Desire and Beloved. Build all the imagined brains with a superstructure of grammar so we can explore hands in all the tenses at once. Pass me the glass the bowl the ceramic plate and all the helpings.