Patched Up Sane

My legs dangle
from a laundromat table
(I resist the urge to answer your call.)
My body vibrates with the washers
my mind spins with the machines
my heart beats out of time 
with the tumble of a dryer. 
I cannot hide here.
I slide to the floor,
my Chucks scuffling to a Lady Pac-Man. 
My pockets stuffed with quarters.
They fall to the floor--
I've forgotten to patch,
forgotten to patch my pockets, again.
You could beat me at this game. But you're not here.
You're calling me.
I squeeze into the seat between the games and
 listen to the fast Spanish around me.
These people do not belong to me,
but they smell so clean
and their lips painted the sweetest pink,
I want to belong to them.


(I answer-
even though you do not belong to me.)
Belong is not the same as own, I say,
There is a difference.
You are not cattle, you say.


This I know. Cattle has value.


I want to belong.
Instead I am washing 5 x 7 days worth of clothes,
mating seventy socks,
pondering how lint finds its way into crevices,
"such meaningless and cloudy trash"
and yet it still catches my fancy.


Instead I am
holed up crazy,
patched up sane,
until I hear from you again.