i dated an alien who didn't like my table manners. i showed up ten minutes early, ordered an amber ale and waited for her on a barstool. she wore a painter's smock and carried a spatula over her head. her hair was wet from the rain but i could tell she was pretty. we made small talk about the free peanuts on the bar, how they were too salty, and how it would just add to your dehydration so wasn't it really kind of dumb. she agreed it was really kind of dumb. she moved her third leg in circles on the sawdust floor and stared at my mouth. either this was a mark of disapproval or she was about to ask me to leave with her. then she said where she came from, you didn't drink beer with your mouth. where she came from, you didn't wear pants with pockets on a first date. she said her last boyfriend would never show up with pockets to a date at a nice establishment and pour beer into his face. then she started to cry, but the tears came out her ears instead of her eyes. everyone in the place looked at me. i put five bucks on the bar, gathered my coat, and walked outside to the mothership.
Diana Salier is the author of LETTERS FROM ROBOTS (Night Bomb Press,
2012) and the chapbook WIKIPEDIA SAYS IT WILL PASS (Deadly Chaps Press,
2011). She lives somewhere on the west coast and tweets random things
@dianasalier.
Street art by Royce Bannon and Seeone.
Photograph by Adam Lawrence.
Sun Airways, from the forthcoming album "Soft Fall," out October 2nd on Dead Oceans.
This is wonderfully strange!
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