Somewhere a Bluebird Trills

I sit in a waiting room heavy with use,

my chair with a crack in its vinyl seat.

Faint smells of rubber and exhaust.

Cosmopolitan two months old,

Newsweek from three weeks ago

that no one touches.

TV grabbing at me

in the corner of the ceiling,

controls out of reach,

no remote.

Volume loud enough to steal silence,

annihilate peace,

but too muted to project news or weather

or headache remedy.

Caught mid-flight in a web of

empty words

in a room without hush

where no one speaks

or watches or listens to

this anesthetizing machine,

phones or laptops preferable,

while somewhere a bluebird trills.

Originally published in Trestle Ties June 2020