From an old, old dream I had that’s never left this ol’ noggin. Until now.
•
Come on down
to Primus’ Storage and Such,
past Route Nobody
and the bait-fridge clutch,
behind the mini-golf elk,
where the gravel tastes like powdered milk,
where raccoons flash cards from the union hall
and the moon gets canned on aerosol.
We got units for jet skis, busted and blue,
four ceramic geese, and a canoe or two,
cranes taxidermied with yellow glass eyes,
lawn-chair relics from divorce supplies.
Each door rolls up with a punished moan,
like a possum caught in a sad trombone.
Each locker sweats with grass and rain,
wet cardboard, mildew, domestic pain.
Bring your padlock. Bring your name.
Bring your box of inherited shame.
Bring your quilt and your busted lamp,
your wedding forks and your fishing stamp.
But don’t bring Dale, by thunder and jab,
unless that feller done settled his tab.
Now the ball pit, friends, hoo boy, behold,
that’s where our enterprise fishes for gold:
thirty thousand spheres in municipal grace,
all rolling around like a plastic disgrace.
Red ones, green ones, yellow ones too,
off-white specimens with dental residue.
Children been swallowed.
Mechanics been changed.
One substitute teacher
came back rearranged.
Went in for his pager in ninety-seven;
ain’t no doubt that feller’s in heaven.
There’s a purple slide like a gentleman’s throat,
a pig-faced mascot in a velvet coat,
one glass eye and a bureaucrat’s stare,
and a waiver for horses
nailed way up there.
“No horseplay,” says the sign, severe,
“unless the horse has signed right here.”
Only fair.
So dive down deep by Branson’s moon,
past gum, old socks, and a plastic spoon,
and you just might find in that spherical mass
a cracked snow globe or a fretless bass,
and the emotional blueprint, curled and sore,
for every bad choice west of the feed store.
Step right up, cousin, step with care.
Rent you a locker and misplace an heir.
Lose a child, find a cousin, store a trampoline,
baptise your crisis in polyethylene.
Weekly rates and monthly rates,
cash-only bargains for desperate fates,
and one Earl discount, dark and rare,
for windowless vans and crawfish prayer.
We are family friendly, more or less,
since families have been seen in this mess.
We are climate controlled, you may observe,
because weather exists by the frontage curve.
We are proud to serve the Tri-County zone
with a well-to-do racket all our own.
Come on down while the doors still groan.
Come on down with your junk and your bones.
Come on down with your cousin Earl,
your broken dreams and your plastic pearl.
Come on down, don’t stand afar,
before the sheriff remembers who you are.
Come on down to Storage and Such.
Don’t ask questions. Don’t touch much.
Unit thirteen hums at night.
Unit nine ain’t sealed up right.
Unit six has a smell like fate.
Unit twelve keeps a calendar date.
And if you hear your mama call
from the ball pit under the bathroom wall,
don’t go crawling. Don’t look back.
That ain’t Mama.
That’s the snack.
Come on down while the rates stay low.
Come on down where the lost things go.
Come on down with your cousin Earl,
your broken dreams and your plastic pearl.
Come on down, don’t stand afar,
before the sheriff remembers who ya are.
