she mustn’t do our laundry
she cannot know how
intricate clothes can be
she can’t read english
(the instructions are not
in portuguese)
she might talk.

she might spill
our secrets
into the washer water.
into the white room – the other

stocky women
faded potato-sack, flower-printed
dresses, rippling over
pitted skin
five black heads – domineering,
sweetly, in cheap shoes
scrubbing at our
stains, sweating grease
paid for by lazy elbows
they enjoy our mess
while we enjoy the opera.

everyone will know.
(she will tell them.
and they will tell)
and then she will fold
these are the box seats she has
at our laundromat theatres

it matters what people know
it matters when they stop talking
knowing we can hear
silence
where our names were
white-gloved hands behind backs, clutching
pilfered dirt, at intermission
(we cannot see through them
if they hide their hands
they have no hands)
cleaved conversations
we don’t want to be knives.

we do, though
but we want to fool you
are we fooling you?

we are not knives
we’re spoons.
secrets don’t belong
in laundry rooms.