haircut justwrite

Stranded hair on the floor, like wings cut away with nothing left to lift, nothing left to lift them. The wind picks up dust outside, full of hot air so we leave the windows open at night, dogs barking through the screens at sounds they can't remember, me clutching false security close to my neck, pretending I'm not safe, my mother's voice but not my mother, just a brief glimpse of sunlight before dawn when it's raining in the kitchen, bars of soap floating past my ankles as if pocket-stuffed tourists with dangling cameras are on top, missing moments they're too busy capturing so time doesn't run into itself any more except when the film is played fast enough we can't see the gaps or the BUY POPCORN in delicious fonts waltzing through the scene that isn't finished until tomorrow, when the hero, head bowed, cries into his palms and we all wonder if this is what relief looks like, or if we're missing the biggest piece, so far away we aren't even sure what shape we're supposed to be. The house is settling in for the night and sounds like unwelcome footsteps and masked faces gliding past the glass door which won't let my sight through when the stars are hiding behind trees, moths thick like ashes in the air, and I think for a moment that my outline will turn to stone and some day your weathered hands will pour plaster where my heart used to be, pull me out of the Earth and set me heavily on a marble pedestal, blinding me with their flashbulbs.