The Junk Collectors

The neighbors are junk collectors
Their house is a pile
Every few days, they pitchfork
one type of junk out through a hole
in the wall or the rooftop or the door
It lands skittle skitter
in their dirt alley.
Then one of them,
I never seem to recognize the same
one twice. Maybe there are twenty people
living in the pile. Maybe junk collectors
become as unique as their wares and never look
the same after spending the night flattened.
One of them slowly stacks the junk,
as best it can be stacked
Smashes it with a foot,
as best it can be smashed.
And takes the good part of a sunny hour
tying purposeful, webbed knots around
the whole fag of likeminded nonesense.
I try to watch, but it's
like a butterfly coming out at last
taking its difficult time.
The last thing to see
is often a woman, often an old woman
plodding toward the edge of her life
with the junk piled on her back
high over her shoulders
a hang glider that would catch
the wind when she leaps.

mar 17, 09