11/24/07

Every once and again, mostly on holidays,
the idea that people have no true
redeeming value pops into my head.
Skipping family for early morning sales,
thirty channels of football,
enough food to feed an African
country for at least a month.
Lines out the door at Starbucks,
young bands playing shoddy tunes
from from the nineties as shoppers
push each other down for the
last Harry Potter gift box set.
Skinny girls laboring behind a counter,
promising themselves that they'll
run off mothers cornbread stuffing
on their next fifteen minute break.
Teenage hard ons clamoring for the
girl in the short skirt in twenty
degree weather.
"She's gotta be noticing me man!"
A time of love lost inside light
and dark meat, pushed behind the piles
of leftovers in your aunts ice box.
What happened to fires and thank yous
and girls who knew to cover their midriff?
Have we lost the simple joy of holding hands?
Looking in each others eyes and saying
"I Love You?"
If long checkout lanes and bust lines are
any indicator, maybe I should just buy
my coffee, stand in line and join in.