Why you hate apples and taking the train home

He can’t see you through the keyhole

because you don’t fit into a fucking keyhole

like the sheets that don’t fit your bed, with coffee stains and blood

stains you’ve grown up

years ago you learned algebra, you forgot

then someone tells you that negative numbers don’t exist

because if you have zero apples and someone takes two

you still have zero apples

then again

you thought you had no self-respect

but when he followed you to your apartment

and threw the twenty dollars when he was done

you suddenly understood the concept of negative numbers

you dump the money out the window and steal the next two apples

that person bought

now you have zero dollars

and they have negative two apples

Your next step will be back behind the yellow line

Geneva is dead, it has been for years

it went out with human decency and leg warmers

the man in the apartment next to yours doesn’t smile

or believe in free education

yesterday you heard that thirty thousand people died somewhere

and that forty eight women get raped

every hour in the Congo

Geneva is dead

you put one foot over the yellow line

thinking about killing yourself

and who can blame you

you think you’re the only one

People aren’t keys, they’re hairpins

The tear in your stocking reaches your knee

your high shoes make it hard to climb the stairs

just take the elevator

people aren’t keys

you’ll realise this when you open the door

find him standing in your apartment

you’ll open your purse, take out your gun

and shoot him

keyholes are keyholes

the hole in him was from a bullet, anyway

Post Script: The whole landscape is fucked

The key fell out of the keyhole

the key doesn’t exist

your tights have always had that ladder behind your left knee

but that’s not the same thing as being torn