I zip up my hoodie, my mottled green
armor against the modern day.
I slip on my true face.
I swing onto the stage, the swagger
cloaks my trembling core.
Behind me, my footsteps are footprints
seeping darkness into the lacquered floor.
In the house, audience silhouettes are
illumined by hand-held black mirrors.
I step onto my mark, into the spot.
A light to be seen by, not to see by.
Night-blind, I lower my hands and the sheaf
of annotated poems.
India ink
beads on my skin as I
fight my flight instinct.
I inhale their anticipation and am still.
My breath is shadowed so
much by the rhythm of my words,
rehearsed and recited, that
I am expounding smoke.
My lips are now foam-flecked with ink.
Words whirl and then waft higher, and
hang heavy.
My exhalations
become the air that they breathe.
My words pop, and like soap bubbles,
beat tattoos against the skin.
At the last,
and for that silent moment, they are
in the palm of my hand.
Audience applause sounds of staccato
rain and, like brief summer
showers, evanesce into memory.
Prompt: Unknown