A sidewalk siren
She spins in the fading daylight
Singing her melody to a parade of lonely passersby
Hem of her dress filthy
From dragging along the piss-soaked
And cigarette littered sidewalk
I can see her thin limbs
Dance detached from her body
Through the thin material of her translucent pink
Slip dress
Pink like berry-stained fingers
Pink like an open wound
Pink like the sores on her bare feet
Pink like the skin around her mouth and nose
Pink like the twisting melodies escaping her lips
Carving patterns in a cloying smog
The eyes clawing at her frame
Revealed by low-hanging sun and thin fabric
They mistake that she is prey
I will not forget her song
Pioneer Square, Seattle, 2017
(photo by Brontë Wittpenn)