a list of public bathrooms

the pink bathroom soap is blooming
between my fingers somewhere in a public place
where other men line up against a wall
& don't make eye contact with each other.
i find comfort in the idea of a peninsula,
how a mass of land can be one leg away 
from an island. sometimes i miss particular 
bathrooms. there was the women's room
in the bottom of my college library-- 
how it was long & wore white tiles & best of all
how no one else was hardly ever there. 
the pink bubbling soap told stories 
about dirt & its desire to make pure
each fingernail. the pink soap climbs wrists 
& asks where the smudges came from. 
i also miss the stalls in this restaurant 
in king of prussia-- how each was a tiny room
with walls the went all the way to the floor.
there's something about the way a stall
isn't really a stall-- how your feet
& your ankles betray you. i want to be
far far out on the tip of a piece of land.
i want the ocean full of nothing but
pink soap. the smell of sanitation. i want
a sanitary body for once. in the bathroom 
every body is a statue. in the bathroom 
all men become singular. the mirror is not
a mirror but a temptation. that small lock
on the stall door. the slick tile floors.
the only thing pink is the soap 
& of course me. if i'm looked at wrong
i lather-- the foam between fingers 
between town under tongue & teeth.
it is a project to stay clean here. 
i imagine myself building land with
bucketfuls of dirt. a place to walk out 
farther. i steal the mirrors from bathrooms
to make the ocean-- one single smooth surface.
where do you go to preen? men never 
fix themselves. men can never be alone.
in a public bathroom i sit in a stall
trying to find alone. a place to exist
& the pink soap is gushing from dispensers 
& trying to find me. i'm clean i promise.
i shower everyday & i even scrub my feet.
crawl into the bathroom sink 
& let the automatic water work me. 
is the lighting good in your favorite bathrooms?
i like a place to take pictures of myself.
white wall. tile floor. parch each cuticle 
in the hand dryer. wipe palms on my pants.
i like a place where no one can see
just how much pink we're dealing with here.
at the far end of the island there are 
surely bathrooms. all kinds of them.
each home with a bathroom & a sink & a window 
with grey clouds peering in & looking
for the hope. we are all very beautiful
in pink. we all her reflects in our 
finger nails even though they are small
& ghost like.