The Laundromat

sterility 

this weekly routine,

or monthly

if quarters go to video store gumball machines

and soda pop vendors

this place feels like a hospital,

it reeks of fresh linen dryer sheets

and detergent,

If it could be a taste it might be chalk, 

I fit here, in this picture,

parading around in grey joggers 

and grey converse,

in a grey room 

feeling blended with grey 

Greyscale entirely 

like some old photograph

but I call myself young and shuffle around

wheely carts, quietly nicking the back of my ankles

every few steps. 

here, I am less than alone 

still shrouded in bleak waves of flourescent lighting 

there is the woman and her grandkids, 

"Eli, I need your quarters,

Abram, bring the dryer sheets"

I already know you are religious, 

you tell so much about yourself 

in your stern demands and 

your predicatable motions. 

I feel the subtle urge to say "fuck" 

loudly, 

enough to foster some small chaos 

in your chapter of the Bible, 

but I keep my head down 

and I add fifty cents to the dryer.