I blink

There is no room this time

No doors to choose between

No checker board tile floor beneath my bare feet

Instead there is pavement

I wake up on it

The black, dry, gritty asphalt underneath me

It’s still night

The exact moment when I left nearly?

I stand up & brush black dust off my cheek

I’m not dressed right for where I am

The white dress I fell in, now dirty, now torn

the rocks sharp against my still naked feet . . .

I look like a lost girl

Who doesn’t know she’s here

Completely out of place

Strange against the settings

Because I am

I am not in an alley

There are no streetlights here

Just sharp, n e o n

I’m in a square area, a back area

Where a few businesses meet & share a dumpster

The colorful lights look at me

And I don’t know where to go

‘Tell me what you want’ , I think

‘Just tell me what you want’

And then coming from behind me

I hear someone singing

So I turn to look at the building

And it doesn’t look like much

Not like the hotel it claims to be

Five stories high,

peeling mint green

And singing

Looking, Listening, Hoping that something else will catch my eye

But nothing does

So I walk away from them

(The Fortune Teller, The Restaurant, The Hobby Store)

And to the Hotel

To see who’s singing

And why