Thursday

(a loose imitation of “Equus” by Austin Hummell)

She sits in the bathtub, watching
her soft brown hair pool around her, the brunette
strands of seaweed clinging to foam,
her face distorted in the faucet -
a silver reflection that she watches while
saying softly one two three four five,
all the way to sixty, and then starts again,
until twelve minutes have passed,
and she says to herself he is late, two hours late.

She has never worn lipstick,
because her mother taught her to play
the clarinet at age eight,
and she has since kept the instrument
immaculate, playing almost every evening,
strengthening her embouchure, pressing
pale fingers onto silver keys as if she were
dialing the phone to reach someone
of great importance - gently but with purpose.
Silent evenings, she would turn the house
into a vessel for the notes she created,
each one played with a subconscious,
yearning hope that it would bring her father home early.

The front door opens with such force
that the metal doorknob kisses the wall, hard,
leaving a bruise on the wallpaper. Her knees
jerk, sending a small wave over the edge of the porcelain,
and she barely avoids tumbling while impulsively
grabbing her green robe instead of a towel.
She thanks her forgetfulness for leaving the
keys in the car, and slides barefoot between rose bushes
and through the back screen door, letting it slam.