1

I walked to the park. There were horses there, Clydesdale’s - but they weren’t Clydesdale’s because a woman asked the man holding them and he named some other name, but I can’t remember. They were beasts. They stood patiently, with blinders on their eyes. I could see their huge heads as skeletons of former monsters, ones archaeologists would wonder about and construct models of, models that were dissimilar, frightening. All of the children wanted to ride them. I touched them both in their sides. They flinched. They were sweating, and their veins popped from their necks like the underbelly of a shrimp. I tasted my fingers where I had touched their sides. It was wild, gritty.

I kept walking. I saw a wedding party, spilling onto the sidewalk from the gated yard. Their noises had a rhythm to them, a bum bum BUM bum – the speech, the speech, the whoops and applause, the silence. An elaborate cart was discarded on the grass next to the yard. It was blue and gold, and metal rods jutted out from the seat and rested heavily on the ground. The grass under them would be tired tomorrow.

A son asked me to take a picture of him and his father by a metal statue. He touched my hands twice while he showed me how to use the camera. His touches were unapologetic and eager. He trusted my eyes and my fingers.

On the broad lawn, an adult football league practiced, their small children watching in disorganized rows from the sidelines. I didn’t know adults played football.

I smiled at the gravel and the trees and a man on a bicycle.

Oh do I love a leerer! Those who look at my legs behind my back, and crane themselves so they can see the curve of my breasts inside my shirt, the hint of undergarment beneath my skirt. I speak of them with disdain and avert my eyes when I walk past.

But they make me feel alive. I am not invisible. My skin is desired.

It is beginning to get dark. People scatter like small ants in the shadow of a shoe. Shadows frighten.