Feeding the Piranha

The tavern’s dark interior is refuge from the heat

that blankets the city in a migraine aura.

The top-shelf bottles are lined up like dancers

in lusty green skirts and amber hues.

The bartender blows foam from a pour

and our eyes meet in the mirror above the bar—

chunks of frost slide off my mug

like a glacier sliding into the sea.

I catch some with my tongue.

He wipes the bar with his towel.

An aquarium sits in the center of the backbar

and piranha sweep the perimeter with empty eyes.

Condensation drips off the bottom of the tank

and I wonder what he feeds them.

Music spills out of the back corner

where a barefoot stranger with a guitar

sits in a pool of light in front of a fan.

The room is a turntable

and the ceiling fan whiffs the nape

of my neck with a reminiscent chill—

wool scarves and galoshes,

snowmen with black button eyes.

The bartender flips a lock of hair off his brow

eyebrows etched in surprise, as if I’d spoken aloud.

A careless flip-flop dangles off my toe

like the towel he tosses to and fro.

The dance floor is chalky with sawdust

and the musician strums a lick

that will repeat in my head

like circling piranhas in an endless loop.

The room is an ocean, salt on our lips,

piranha swimming free,

he inside of me