Triptych for a Tuesday I. The circle tightens. Someone says alignment and the word hangs there like a compass needle spinning in a room full of magnets. We nod. We nod. We nod. The nodding is the work. II. Two cups cool between us. You say the thing beneath the thing and I hear it land the way a coin lands— heads, tails, it doesn't matter, what matters is the settling. III. But by one o'clock we are talking about paintball. Names on a list. Guns that aren't guns. The afternoon cracks open like something bright and stupid and I want in. I want in. I want the bruise, the yelling, the permission to run.