When in a supermarket
in a town not
your own
do not start screaming
“Where are the olives? Where are the fucking olives?”
as you race down the aisles
Do not wonder aloud
(or even to yourself)
how it is that everyone
hasn’t gone completely mad
in their quest to
satiate the need for
fruits of the brine
Do not ask fellow customers, staff, or
innocent bystanders
how they are managing to
navigate society
while remaining tethered to reality.
Some of them aren’t,
they’re just distracted by
colorful boxes of cereal
Do not appear to be in
too much of a hurry as you
frantically search the shelves for
manzanillas, kalamatas, gaetas
Please walk at browsing speed and
try not to dart between people like you’re
running out of time.
Even though your mind is already
into next week
you are expected to be present wherever you are,
perhaps the produce section
Erase that intense desperation from your eyes,
you will find what you need
ultimately
maybe in aisle 5.
The anxiety is all in your head but also
hanging in the air, demanding attention like
this week’s sale signs
Try not to look utterly befuddled
like you’ve never before been in a supermarket
even if everything is shaken and
out of place like
the lopsided setting of a recurring dream, or
an unwanted box of Tampax haphazardly abandoned
between the penne and campanelle
While you wonder how to
make sense of the shelving system,
how to think without
overthinking,
how to speak without
misspeaking,
the market has since
closed down around you
and you catch your reflection, realizing:
you are
no longer
young
and pretty.
Rebecca M. Ross is a writer, educator, and avid hiker and backpacker currently living in New York’s Hudson Valley. Her writing has been published in Streetcake Magazine, Whimsical Poet, The Westchester Review, Soul-Lit, and Peeking Cat. She also has poetry forthcoming or published in Uppagus. Rebecca often longs for her ancestral homeland of Brooklyn where her weirdness blends in better. Her favorite bands are Phish and Ween.
