plastic beads
ray heinrich
You were a neighbor's kid who lived a block over and i
watched you grow up from a block over and i wasn't that
sure of your name until a few days ago and you have ceased
and i'm sitting here at work and these thoughts of you keep
getting stuck in my pile of other thoughts that i get paid
for in this palace of earning, this shrine to being seen
while doing, this turnstile with a counter that adds up
the hours and passes them to accounting which multiplies
them times dollars to get my answer in rent and food and
a heart-shaped waffle-iron that i only used once and some
non-stick pans that stuck and some ice cube trays that didn't
but i can't use them cause there's no room in the freezer
cause it's filled with food i've saved for years and will
never eat so i'm hoping for a long power failure to thaw it
and i need a tornado or a hurricane and not you drunk
teenagers running into my light pole because it only took
the power company four hours to fix their wires and that
wasn't long enough and someone put a small cross up
that got decorated with flowers and letters and poems
and a hair beret with a white cat on it and some
plastic beads they said you got at Mardi Gras.
