While the roof leaked oil through slim, glittering cracks
their edges black with petroleum and rainwater,
I slept like a drunk in my stalled blue Honda.
The buses pass over me like men in the aisles of bars,
each cigarette burned to the filter.
Kristina Marie Darling is an English major at Washington University in St. Louis. She is the author of four chapbooks: Fevers and Clocks (March Street Press, 2006), House of Mirrors (March Street Press, 2006), House of Fame (Powerscore Press, 2006), and The Traffic in Women (Dancing Girl Press, Forthcoming in October 2006). Her poems and personal essays have appeared or are forthcoming in several online and print publications including The Mid-America Poetry Review, Wicked Alice, freefall, Subtle Tea, and The Other Voices International Project. She also received a nomination for the Pushcart Prize in 2006.