Office Space
by D. K. Sterling

Her hair looks like
a tangle of shoelaces...
frayed and worn,
having been sloshed
through mud
dangling over eyes
that seem to say,
"does anyone miss me?"

Eyes that survey
this office space
the real estate of the streets,
where she "works"
and pretends to live,
with all the other
crack pipe warriors--
wasted, twisted,
and broken down soldiers.

Walking dirty fingers
across her lips,
thinking of men
she once did attract--
so well dressed, well paid,
and very well equipped
to show her a good time.

Now, all she can harvest
are the sewer low bums
down and out on their luck,
smelling just as badly
as she does...

dissolved and diluted
in the dope jar of her head,
by the white powder sniffed
and the little pipe lit,
as she's slipped
from upper-class sheets
into a four alarm fire--
her pink party dress
up in smoke.

Dazed and slumped
she sits clawing
at unshaven legs,
until spying a hunter
offering relief
in a small plastic bag...
then pushes herself up
onto unsteady feet
to follow.

Around the corner
they disappear,
his tongue protruding
through a broken tooth smile;
she staggers along
prepared to negotiate
the trade of a lay
for enough cocaine
to chase her troubles...

but as she reaches
to take his medication,
he snatches her wrist
slapping her hard
against ragged bricks;
eager to give her
a different kind of hit.

(Poetry Super Highway)