Curbside Wizardry, perhaps people,
and Red Queens.

At some point we've met everyone
at a bus stop and told them 
we loved them-- 
and I don't just mean
goodbye mothers and 
cross station boyfriends 
I mean perhaps people-- the 
waiting for their bodies to unfurl
into voices from
the seats next to you--
for their phone calls to their
wives or music in
their headphones singing tinny and 
distant like the ghosts of wind-up birds.
He taught me to
read everyone's palms while they sleep
and tell them how many children their
hands will branch out to love and 
how many window seats they'll sleep on
He taught me
the forces of God
breathe diesel-- fill the empty spaces
near windows and the distance
between all the perhaps people
sitting oceanic centimeters apart.
I met him on a curbside
but I had always known him 
as another perhaps person-- the man with
the wizard hat who was either
your father or a prophet or
a wind-up bird who sang like tin--
he measured time with a deck of cards
made of only RED QUEENS and 
JOKERS-- because they're
the only cards you need to play 
WAR-- 
or so he says 
And he guessed where I was from
by the way I held my mittens like
toads and he knew I was scared
and he knew I kept Sundays
as holy as oatmeal and apples--
the curbside wizard pulled 
kittens from my suite case and
corn snakes from my back pack  
and called me MOTHER MOTHER and 
RED QUEEN and OATMEAL GODDEX
and I said that I knew
what I was. He named me
WINDOW SEAT and removed his
white gloves to show off his blue hands--
I told him it was cold 
and he said 
Not in August 
and put each glove over my
wind-up bird fingers and pronounced 
me Sorceress and August. 
He said 
I would fall in love 
with more RED QUEENs if I didn't
learn how to keep time
with the kittens and the corn snakes
and that there were only 
so many jokers to pull from
a deck and only so many ways to
wear a wizard hat and not fall into
a star-- die a perhaps person 
on the curb and let people 
breath you diesel and poetry.
I told him to take a window seat
and I'd keep safe the aisle so 
we wouldn't both fall into everyone's
tin-voices and the thrashing
wheels of God driving us to home--
So of course he kissed me--
like all bus stops do.
Told me that window seats 
were named by girl-bodies like me--
that he was a curbside wizard--
that he was only ever a perhaps 
but that I could write my
name in fog windows-- sing in everyone's 
earphones and do palm readings
by the reluctant Morris Code of street lamps
through the city-- asked me to pick a card--
any card and guess what it would be.
Of course I said
RED QUEEN
and he laughed and pulled jokers 
from my sleeves-- out came 
KING and JACK and SPADE--
I windowsill and white glove
and perhaps girl and perhaps 
queen picked up sidewalk cards
to find him gone-- wizard hat
on the bench
I RED QUEEN and curbside.
I perhaps am left reading my own palms 
and counting the minutes
at the bus stop with a stack
of jokers and red queens.