Rickey Laurentiis


Adventures of He's A Bomb

There's very little talk of "family" at the airport.
So he comes here—

though it's difficult inching past security.
What with his metal arms, legs. And heart.

That his skin isn't brown—evidence for greater
scrutiny relieves him, thank the Engineer.

But it's mercury, nonetheless. The color
of lonely instability.

He flirts with a Metal Detector,
theorizes: The airport is

an anxious site. Of connection
and disconnectionâ

Is it, therefore, instable: subject to fault?
Is it, therefore, a machine?

His program runs the code, again, again
toward a pursuit of the "truth" of it.

Is that his mom he sees in the escalator?
His eyes blink. Uncle elevator?

His sister, perhaps, the moving floor?
What is a sister? And what's she used for?

He won’t notice himself reflected
in the stares of human passers-by, little kids

and their parents' eyes. They think
(and they mutter this)

he's a bomb.