Calibration

Jessica Rowshandel

Your skin is a uniform. Against the 9am lights
fluorescent tucked into the ceiling tiles
your face must be as clean
as these white walls as the white
roof of the mouth, your bleached cubicle teeth
and quiet snowfall carpet tongue
You must at least be lighter than a brown paper bag
like how we calibrate our neighbors
in the suburbs against the Sun
We believe in diversity, in equity, in inclusion, but
do not get the bag wet, scrub the browning water stains
from the ceiling tiles with the white shine
of your bright bulb body
until the dirt is gone

Jessica Rowshandel (they/them) is a queer BIPOC writer, musician, and visual artist from Los Angeles (via NYC). They hold an M.S. from Columbia University in social work. Employed since age 11, they have lived the child labor to customer service to social work pipeline. Way before the pandemic, they traded their social work career for a remote tech career. The absence of an office and water cooler small talk has been life changing. Their creative writing has been published in HiConcept Magazine (2017), Epiphanies and Late Realizations of Love (2019), and Fever Spores: The Queer Reclamation of William S. Burroughs (2022). For more information please visit jessicarowshandel.com Twitter: @JRowshandel