As soon as I can, I’m going to become a whole different person, because whenever I talk to myself, I’m uncertain about who’s listening to whom. Naturally, it takes some time to get to know yourself, especially if you’re not interested. I think I’ll wait here until something beautiful happens. Pride goes before a fall, even if it doesn’t burn many calories. Each year, I stand in the shower for three-thousand, six hundred, and fifty minutes. The water smooths its cool hologram over me as I wonder, Am I a security threat because I have no heart? Both sides claim that the other side suffered heavy casualties. Of course, that doesn’t explain why there are so many sharp-dressed dead people walking around town. Is this a motel or a hotel? There are so many guests here, but no one seems to know if it’s OK to hunt them for food, or for sport.

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Brad Rose was born and raised in Los Angeles, and lives in Boston. He is the author three collections of poetry and flash fiction, Pink X-Ray (Big Table Publishing, 2015), de/tonations, (Nixes Mate Press, 2020), and Momentary Turbulence (Cernvena Barva Press, 2020). WordinEdgeWise from Cerven Barva Press is forthcoming in later 2021. His poems have appeared in Cultural Weekly, Bending Genres, the LA Times, and the American Journal of Poetry. A complete list of publications is available at: http://bradrosepoetry.com/2019/03/a-list-of-publications/ Brad’s website is: www.bradrosepoetry.com Selected readings can be heard at http://bradrosepoetry.com/audio-readings/