Everything in this hotel room looks as if it might collapse. The one octagon-shaped table, flimsy as cardboard; drawers missing from the nightstand that grins mockingly like a snaggle tooth smile; the TV without knobs; bedspread hard and stiff as sheet metal.

There is shit all over the place, like there has been a fight.

A puddle of green wax lies hardened next to the bed. An accident from last night. Other accidents: a shattered wine bottle in pieces scattered in front of the door. A booby-trap for anyone who walks in-or out; a dismembered Bible strewn across the floor; a torn photo of a girl pined to the wall in two jagged half’s.

Accidents are happening all the time, nobody ever stops them.

My friend Joe lost his hand in a machine at a carpet mill. He never played guitar or piano. He never had a lover. My sisters ex-husband ran his motorcycle of an exit ramp somewhere in Florida in the middle of the night hang-gliding on coke. A station wagon found him at sunup. I lost seven dogs and too many cats to remember to speeding cars in the middle of the suburban street I grew up on. A gray one once at its kittens under and old white latter in the backyard. I watched as it picked at the pieces that looked like macaroni. A kid I went to elementary school with died in a car wreck last year. I looked him up in my third grade yearbook. I remembered his face. I hadn’t seen him since then.

                                                                                              ~~adam stanley