The Poet In The Post Office

The poet stood in the post office and saw gravity tugging at the people, and the people tugging back; Saw law, glowering in the corners waiting for frailty;   Saw anthrax of ennui sift  over the slot     for Stamped Mail. Posted uncertified from Apollo's thundering chariot, window-whittled packages of solar light squat and wept on  marble floors flayed with the hoof of man's rudderless will, the poet saw. Metaphor's captive mouse, the poet watched as Demeter, famished for the soul's ripe fruitfulness, swooned into the bones of a woman blown, like silk pollen from Asia, who stood patiently holding a  box sealed with her years. Thin, thin birdsong hair, and gaunt of cheek, the little woman stood resisting. . .resisting, and then, the poet's astigmatic eyes saw the bomb inside the box addressed to the Fruit Growers of California, for 10,000 morning mists of insecticide, payment in full. Or...leaping over logic's wide crevasse...was it home-made jam for the shop in Santa Cruz?) "That's not the right box, Ma'm--the Right one is over There.  You'll have to re-wrap it." (. . .flutter of bird wing, as the prey adjusts to the hawk...) -and the poet saw the wall in the eyes of the postal employees, halting our burdensome need, as taught in government school... which is near their secret homes, in clamshells under the sea, and the poet left that place for the wind of the hills, and her skylark pen. Written January 4th, 2002 © on Jan 04 2002 07:39 AM PST, Carole Dudley   0 • 10