Do you know—
what happened to my portable hot-tub? she asks,
the one that filled in four minutes
with a bottom like a waterbed? I shake
my head. She enters my stall
and backs me against the tiles. Someone
took a knife to it. I keep soaping,
hoping my intimate attentions will suggest
more space between us. She looks
me up and down. I know, she says,
who did it. I know. I point
to my ears, earplugs just visible. I
can’t hear you well, I apologize. She
steps closer. A hot soak in the morning
and at night relaxes, she says. I nod,
the spray from my naked body
splashing hers. Yes, it does. Now,
we’re on the same page. I jet
the suds out of my eyes and think
she’s vanished, but as I leave
catch her once more
through the plate glass,
superimposed on my reflection,
at bliss.
Devon Balwit has recent poems in The Worcester Review, The
Cincinnati Review, Tampa Review, Apt (long form issue), Tule Review,
Sugar House Review, Poetry South, saltfront, and Grist, among
others. She lives a life of pleasant anarchy and peaceful resistance in
Portland, OR.