Where is Kafka?

Sometimes I imagine 

sitting under our dining table,

wanting to chop my hair off, 

days and nights oppressed, 

yet not to run the rat race. 

Partly because I was too resistant 

to be happy, 

but with the first monsoon showers, 

I almost collapsed 

inside my oversized grey T-shirt

 that began to turn white, 

infinite gaps inside mind channels,

 I sat and watched 

strange men winning Wimbledon.

 I stopped writing 

one thousand words a day, 

themes and perspectives

 slipped into a closed brown diary,

 and I always worried 

what if someone finds it 

and reads it aloud 

in the public sphere in Prague,

 right in front of 

David Cherny’s rotating Kafka,

 how miserable

 he died thinking he was worthless,

 how miserable it would be-

 to listen to voices

 that came beneath my dining table. 

I talk to a shy Kafka,

every day,

 under our dining table, 

today he shaved my head.