Kroger,
Bloomington IN (August 2015)
by
Hiromi Yoshida
Bike
rush to Kroger—
in
my employee-discounted Indiana University fitness leggings and Target
sports
bra—for $4.99 Barefoot Pinot Grigio and possibly sushi (only if 1
pkg costs less than $6.00)—culminated in braking @ the bike rack
before a window glass reflection that was narcissistically pleasing
—wind
blowing long fine hair in one direction—freshly shampooed and
conditioned
with Matrix Biolage hair care products, styled by Connie @ Perfect
Illusion—I felt like a supermodel (despite my XS petite size)—the
sun and the wind and my strength merging and coursing through my
caffeine-fueled body in one powerful surge—pulsating outwardly from
sun-saturated bodywashed pores… Directly juxtaposed with this
glass reflection just around the
redbrick
corner with the sign reading:
“No
Loitering
Or
Panhandling”
solidly
stood a woman with chunky ankles, askew skirts, wispy faded hair
pulled back in a slovenly ponytail, whose gaze met mine quite
inadvertently behind my Nine West shades (exorbitant plexiglass
barrier between ourselves). I U-locked my Trek bike:
the
woman seemed like she wanted to shrink into herself—possibly
disappear around some remote corner that only she could access—where
she could loiter or panhandle for a sympathetic smile without adverse
repercussion. And indeed she did
(disappear)
the moment I looked up from my U-lock—an unlikely grey specter in
the south side of Bloomington, Indiana—as improbable as my own
reflected window glass self—shimmering arbitrary fragments of
economic value that can never really add up.
Bio:
Hiromi
Yoshida has been described as one of Bloomington’s “finest and
most outspoken poets” by Tony Brewer, Chair of the Writers Guild at
Bloomington, Indiana. Her poems have been published in The Asian
American Literary Review, Indiana Voice Journal, Evergreen Review,
and The Rain, Party, & Disaster Society.