People in new situations

storming – and it's weather
and coming from all sides,
like the last pieces shifting
in a rapid game of chess. my feathers
frozen in flight
I walk, hounded by rain
which seeps through my jacket
until my armpits are hothousing
mushrooms. another apartment
gone before I got there – I walk, persevering
against a conspiracy of landlords
working together to catch me
pneumonia, or some other type
of waterborne disease. and I’d stood in the queue
for hours, along with various
people, all of us searching
for some new situation. afterward, we walk
toward town in a cluster,
people flaking off down sideroads, rain rotting
our unspeakable party
like badly varnished wood
and rusting gratings on the front of houses
full of studios. a bus passes – hits a puddle
and soaks me. it might as well
not bother, like waves
on a broken boat.

DS Maolalai has been nominated seven times for Best of the Net and three times for the Pushcart Prize. His poetry has been released in two collections, Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden (Encircle Press, 2016) and Sad Havoc Among the Birds (Turas Press, 2019).