Ironing Shirts on a Friday Night

Steam coiling around his shoulders

The man irons without precision
Twenty-three or forty-three
He always presses too hard
Boiling seams
Billowing steam from under the collar
Unrelenting
He wishes it would burst into flames
but it only twists oddly

So much freedom in the greeting of a locked door
Do you really want to be looked after?

Pause to observe the wrinkle
Tilt the iron back slowly

Then the midnight train
will rattle the ironing board
Grinding banshee metal from the tracks
Seals the evening
He pulls the plug
and disappears