Through the lens, I watch myself
watching him watching himself
scrub the infinite white bowls
in Shibuya Station's basement level.

"This is cinema," whispers the me
that isn't me, as his blue-gloved hands
move like butoh dancers across
the ceramic galaxy of toilets.

Frame 2, 394:
His reflection multiplies in every surface,
twelve versions of duty
in a public restroom mirror
while salarymen pretend
he's made of negative space.

"Keep rolling," says the director
who might be my conscience
or just another synapse firing
in the dark theater of my skull.

The camera catches him practicing
English on lunch break, rehearsing
"The weather is nice today"
to an audience of ****** cakes
while I practice watching him
practice being watched.

Sometimes the film grain blurs
and I can't tell if I'm the viewer
or the viewed or the viewfinder
documenting this infinite loop
of seeing and being seen
in the fluorescent purgatory
of other people's waste.

Frame 10, 957:
He bows to the toilet
like it's a small god
of porcelain and pipes,
and I bow to the screen
that contains him
containing himself.