Anointing at Low Speed

The fan keeps making weather
from what will not leave:
warm lint, salt, oil,
the laugh-track arriving late
from a television no one faces.

She has gone under
in the deep chair,
one cork wedge half-off,
one hand open near the bowl
as if sleep were paid out
in orange change.

Sun through the blinds
rules the wall in narrow bars.
The shag rises and settles
where the fan can reach it,
a field practising breath.

In the glass dish,
old ash holds a thumbprint.
On the remote,
black buttons wear their harvest.

No one has crowned her.
Still, the armrests curl inward
like patient animals;
the vinyl warms around her calf;
the room learns the shape
of her unavailable body.

Then the motor clicks down.

The hair at her temple
stops lifting.
The stripes on the wall
stay striped.
Heat, having nowhere better,
chooses the chair.

When she wakes,
orange remains
in the wrist-crease,
under one nail,
on the remote’s last channel.

She touches the glass,
the door latch,
the tap’s dull tooth.
Each takes a little colour
and gives back ordinary metal.

After she leaves,
the cushion keeps
not her body,
but its hollow.

The fan turns,
not loyal,
not free.

Under the table,
one fallen curl
keeps its colour
where no hand
can claim it.