TAKING RUSSIAN LEAVE

One takes a seat. One does not speak.

The heating pipes only blubber and

detonate. It’s dark. At your empty hand

one fixedly stares. A guess, oblique,

tells that the stupid soul’s on strike

when what is brewing is an end,

which cold stares on the skin portend.

Ears roar. Blood pressure hits a peak.

One waits and waits. All right, then, says

the silent suitcase. Well you know

that this long minute can’t recur.

Get up, before the dawn’s first rays,

and do what you are prompted to

before the room is bare.