A Room Full of Blind, Old Men
Jason Fraley

The vertigo has faded. They take turns
reconstructing the scenario: someone opened
the blinds at noon, light narrowed their pupils,
then no need to blink. Of course this is not true,
but everyone speaks of the same event

with pursed lips, mouths not shaped
for song. No one knows the color
of these walls, which were not intended as gifts.

Someone trips—here lay the dead.
Everyone feels the cold skin. A doctor enters,
pulls a handkerchief from his throat,
a last will of no belongings and one sentence:
“a white imprint is harder to preserve than I thought.”