Ctrl

By: Riley Strait

My favorite button
on the keyboard
is Ctrl.

    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    (Ctrl + C)
    
        Safe is a set of five.

Don’t ask me why –
I couldn’t begin to answer.

But if you really forced me to,
then I would stutter around,
searching for some explanation
at least halfway sane – something
I can play off as an idiosyncrasy.

    (id·i·o·syn·cra·sy)
        Safe is  not   a    set     of      six.

    (ec·cen·tric·i·ty)
        Safe is a set of five.

Something I can play off as an
            eccentricity.

(That’s better.)
    That’s better.

An eccentricity: like how, on an escalator,
I have to board on the fifth rotating step
behind the last person who got on.

    To ensure structural integrity.

Or how, to avoid setting foot in a public restroom,
I’ll restrain from drinking water in the morning
or before I go out.

    No telling what goes on in a public restroom.

Or how I have to beat the decorative towel
in the bathroom with my hairbrush
before I leave for school.

    Because I said so.
So if you asked me why I like
the button Ctrl so much,
I wouldn’t know what to say.

For something so elusive and fleeting in life,
it’s just there on the keyboard:

    Press me.

Ctrl,

    Ctrl,

        [Ctrl]