I never go so far as to sit on the toilet
when I’m hiding in a bathroom.
It’s enough to just stand behind the door,
counting a wall’s worth of subway tiles
and then splash a little water around,
drying off whatever residue is left
from any hands I managed to shake.
You have to time it just right so that
people will think you had too much
to drink, but not that you’re in danger.
It’s almost like the acting involved
in picking at the food on your plate
so intimately that guests treat it as
a conversation they shouldn’t interrupt.
Tonight, crowded on the balcony
but drifting emptily like an ice crystal
that never learned how to formulate
its way into one of the nearby clouds,
I pulled out one of my oldest tricks,
which was to pretend to take a call
and walk hurriedly out, so as to be
heard by nobody on the other end.
Whenever I do this, I always talk about
some other rendezvous I’m planning.
It often sounds like me and nobody
have some can’t-miss adventure
ahead of us. It often sounds like
we’re going to have the best time.