this is a test of the emergency alert system

i hear as i'm ambling through town 
to the bus stop in the grey-blue morning.
the cold is blooming today, watered
by our reluctance to open front doors. 
no one else seems to notice the alert as 
the buildings blur into each other--
their lines betraying proximity,
wriggling then thrashing. i blur into
the people i pass: a man with black 
dress shoes, a woman wearing 
sand-dollar-sized sunglasses, a boy
with finger-less gloves. we're 
all going the same place sort of,
we pulling different directs. the bus
stop is an emergency: a tongue pressed
to the roof of one of our mouths. 
only one of us will commute today.
there are bodies under the ground,
clapping to shake the earth
as the train rolls by. the train
is just a zipper on two of our
pants: opening into a mouth
of air: a gust. this is just a
test. always a test. your voice
asks me why i haven't been sleeping
& the emergency alert screams louder
so i don't have to talk about it.
thank you emergency alert, even
if you're not real. a buttery hum.
a hollow honk. all buildings have
all collaborated. there's now
only one building, great & tall
& full of elevators. the boy
wearing finger-less gloves 
might have always been me. 
the woman takes off her glasses
& she vibrates into an ocean.
she's from underground & plucks
a stop sign out of the ground 
to use to shovel home. so we separate
& the nice black shoes aren't mine
& i feel younger in the glaze 
of the moment. the test worked
i think. i want to tell someone
that it did. i want to call my
mother & tell her everything blurry 
& everything about my fingers
at the bus stop. the voice
crumbling: the crust of a blueberry 
pie. the voice ending: bubbling
the sidewalk street cauldron. 
we're quite the alerting emergency
around here.