Blue Squares

This morning I actually saw it.

The shower curtain.

Small blue squares in rows.

Geometric. Repeating.

I've been standing behind this curtain

for two years, maybe more.

Showering. Rinsing.

Never once did I look at the pattern.

Today, standing with nothing to do,

nowhere to go after,

I looked.

The squares are exactly the same size.

The rows are exactly the same distance apart.

Someone chose this.

Someone thought: I will put blue squares

on a shower curtain.

I stared at it for so long

that the squares started to separate,

started to become individual objects

instead of a pattern.

Individual blue squares on plastic.

When I stepped out of the shower,

I forgot about it immediately.

But I know I'll see it differently now.

The way you can't unsee something.