It’s been five minutes.
I don’t want to be here.
No one chooses to be here.
There’s unenthusiastic page-turning,
and I see the beating of wings.

It’s been thirty minutes.
These walls cast the same shadows as my bedroom,
or is it smoke rising from the air vents?
There are no windows here,
but no one is afraid.
What do they know that I don’t?
When did their bodies adapt?
Maybe they’re holding their breaths too.

Sometimes I pretend we are here for the same reason.
I’m here because my spirit has atrophied,
and I couldn’t move if I wanted to.

I’ve been sitting here for twenty-seven years,
before I knew how to tell time,
waiting for my sentence,
waiting to hear my name.

What will they call me today?