The Word-a-day Writing Challenge

Day Thirty-Six: Booty

Sometimes
you wake up
under a bicycle.

This is not a metaphor.
This is real life. This is HD,
                                         baby.

Sometimes you find yourself
on the ground one night
on the edge of someone's lawn
with a bicycle strewn across your chest,
staring up at the night sky shaking its weary head
at the whole world on a slant, in a tangle
of tequila and regret.

Then you think of Stephanie,
who is no one
you know—just
a friend
of a friend
you saw in some pictures
somewhere.

Stephanie, from what little you can tell,
is a casual woman at a party, holding
a glass of something,
wearing a sweater, smiling
at whoever
stands behind the lens. She is also
a serious woman at a cafe in a city
where brick buildings tower
outside leaded glass windows. Neither photo
is in colour so Stephanie
is all black
and white
and grey.

So simple, isn't it?

This is how Hollywood works, except it's not just
Hollywood anymore. This is how everything works.

It isn't about the booty—
call it treasure, call it ass.
It's about how everything looks better
from far away and
everyone's more beautiful
when they can't look you in the eye

or find you staked to reality
under an impossible cluster of stars,
cheap tequila, and
a bike.