INSTRUCTIONS FOR WAITRESSING #2

portal through the silver door
to a hustle of irritable utensils 
vegetables huddled in metal cradles
ladles swinging fluorescent halos 

appreciate the immaculate precision 
of the ticket-holder how neatly it sinks 
its teeth into paper and demands 
a choreography of kitchen bodies

master the disastrous anatomy 
chromatic corners hungry for hips 
spidering cracks gnawing at shoes 
a maze with metallic consequences 

understand the constellation of time 
spread over the kitchen in a network 
of glowing digits rising and falling 
into crescendos of beeps and buzzes 

take too long in the fridge and consider 
the onions hanging in their red netting 
their stillness so unnegotiable you wonder
if they formed first and then the world 

Gabriella Lindsay is a poet and librarian. Gabriella holds an MA in Information Science and is the proud co-editor of the collaborative zine, Cher, which was created by and for the queer writers and artists community of Louisiana. Gabriella is a librarian at the LSU Libraries and tinkers on art between links expiring. You can read Gabriella’s work in ANTIGRAVITY, The Columbia Review, Trampoline, and others.