Burn in Hell
A man plucks scraps of trash
from the pavement with a claw
at the end of a stick,
shoves them into a bag,
continues his march.
He skirts the metal barricades
surrounding the gaping sinkhole
that opened up in the middle of the street
last week. macadam and brick and stone
and dirt, layered like a cake down
into the darkness.
Easter is on April twentieth this year,
and the air is thick with the smell of weed
as cannabis aficionados celebrate
their favorite way to escape
the horrors of the world.
It’s also Adolph Hitler’s birthday,
as well as Pineapple Upside-down Cake Day,
though its orgins are obscure.
I’m sitting on the porch
listening to Junior Kimbrough’s band
holler and stomp like a rickety station wagon
barreling along the litter-strewn highway.
One of them flicks a cigarette
out the open window
where it sparks against on the asphalt
and it plucked by the man
with the stick and the claw
and placed without a word into the bag
where it slowly, silently continues to smolder.
No comments:
Post a Comment