Saturday, June 13, 2009

Yard Sale for TOP & The Monday Poetry Train

A father and son
play baseball
in their yard.

Every time the boy
hits the ball
a dog chases it

then they have to chase
the dog. I slip
this image

into my word bank.
A scrawny woman
sits on her porch,

cigarette dangling
from her lips,
watching ragged kids

run around her messy
yard, the butt bobbing
as she yells at them.

I add her to the piggy bank
getting heavier
by the mile.

A fine, muscled specimen
of maleness
is mowing a lawn

shirtless, all bronzed
and chiseled. Another
shiny coin

of detail slides
into the bank.
I continue driving

my eyes eating up
every morsel.
When I get to camp,

I’ll break the bank open
and write a poem about
the human yard sale.

7 comments:

Richard Wells said...

Big smile, but the butt bobbing threw me. I couldn't figure out whose butt it was - butt as in booty is what I thought, and I tried to picture the woman's butt bobbing, then the kids' butts bobbing, but then I figured out it was the cigarette.

Jeeves said...

Wow..Break the bank open and write abt human yard sale. This almost moved my thinking to a different dimension.

anthonynorth said...

That was a marvellous ending.

Julia Phillips Smith said...

I love it! You've captured the frame of mind it's so hard to describe to non-writers. Beautiful images for your bank.

Andy Sewina said...

Great images, you accumulated!
Love the bit about the messy yard!

Anonymous said...

isn't great to go around with your eyes open like that - and so much richer for it.

paisley said...

this is priceless linda and makes me want to become more aware of my surroundings... excellent piece.....

Linda's Poems