Braila, Romania. The sun crunches under my boots, shattered off the rime of the snow. One foot in front of another, bored soldier in the patrol checking papers of each and everyone leaving the town. Step. Step. Produce the folded, creased, yellow-stained evidence, avoid eye contact. Dead eyes in the face of the young man in uniform. Disinterest

Step. Step. Strip the gloves from your hands as you pass, strip the glue and hair away between cars. Settle in your hood and scarf and remake your disguise.

As the train roars away into the woods, your ragged, snow-capped, tousle-haired head of downy black flutters away into the winter wood, and the snowbanks eat of the dreams of a young man who never was.

There are wolf teeth at your bound breast, and red lipstick on your neck. Under the snowbanks, some gypsy communist woman's tousled blonde hair, the curls of a dancer girl who never was, a connection never met, is slowly freezing into a thick, bloodstained mess.

The train howls as it runs into the far hills, and the scarf runs away into the night under stone and frozen dirt.

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