The chair rail

The paper chair rail is much like a tapestry I once saw in the basement

of a yellowed college's history department. 
Then, like now, I was waiting to go on stage. 

In my seventeen year residence of this bedroom

I have painted over most of it

the hot pink border has yellowed

and the flowers have curled mid-flight

just as they would if they were not printed by a large machine

wherever wallpaper is printed. 

Likewise, the men were neither sewn in nor were they men. 

Just a history lesson-- from a hope

waiting to go on stage

from a band of heroes to

stretched along the corridor of a yellowed basement

a history lesson.

-Citron