candy for lunch (empty ski place near Armstrong, B.C.)
thirty years old
running a shop
that sells nothing:
printed with the name of this place,
nowhere,
somewhere.
it’s empty: out of season ski strip.
fur hats and beaver t-shirts
compete jostling for no-one
we’ve gone in,
it was open
why we came up here
i don’t know
i don’t ski
there’s no snow right now anyway
she’s come out from behind the counter
pale, glitter, alone
her boyfriend is in town
there’s no business
i want to go
but the older relation
stays, chatting
of nothing
looking at well-priced
nothing
and this nothing-child
this poor lost beast
whose mother never even taught it
what to eat
offers us,
tentative
(normally there is no need
when there are more
customer people
they just talk , you know?)
of her empty time
and of her food:
a small plastic bag
with some coloured bits of candy in it:
her lunch, she says
desperatepaleglitter
such feelings as tear at my chest
and eyes
i cannot say
we have lost all our children
alone, they play
(adult), & all forlorn.
2009 Peter Greene.
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