Tales Of Young Women

By Millicent Howard

I drink until my stomach swells, heavy with something more than life.

I smoke with strangers outside dim-lit bars, watch my spit miss their ashen heaps—

Two piles at the edge of our footing, simultaneously growing apart.

Their eyes flicker with interest, but my gaze is hollow, adrift in the taste of burnt lips and borrowed warmth.

I am addicted to subway rides home, to the hum of steel and fluorescent solitude. 

Here, I can watch men without the weight of being watched, no expectations, no invitations—

 just the fleeting comfort of reflection in glass.

I think of my bed, of washing away the night,

 of slipping free from my alluring costume.

 And when sleep takes me, I dream of alleyways and moonlit waltzes,

 where I know I am acting—

 but for once, I am unchained.