Shisa Poet
PIZZA ON RYE ROAD
A big place, this world. I leave my room
to buy a pizza, look across town to tree-blue
hills, see boys play soccer in late April
rain, I kick a ball when it hits
my foot, miss the goal, and one kid wants
to know if I have ever scored. I shake
my head, Have you? Oh sure, in matches too!
Go out on the stairway to throw an empty
pizza-box down the chute, look up into the gap
between railings, all the way to the twelfth floor.
Sally on the ninth, mentally disabled, loves
to fold my clothes if she catches me in the Laundry.
We carry clean piles back upstairs, she pauses
for a smoke, gets dizzy trailing high violet swirls.
The moon enters my one-room flat, lets me borrow
a creamy square of carpet for my bare lino floor.
Migrant birds return from Africa, a wagtail heads
towards the subway, at home and in a hurry
just like me. Last week my plane flew above the pizza
place on Rye Road, but didn't drop me off, like bus
drivers will at unscheduled stops when you ask nicely.
Location: Oslo, Norway Email: andsheknowsit@hotmail.com Publications: nectarzine, Stirring V3:E8
