Tuesday, November 04, 2008

Dead Butterfly Flapping


The neighborhood video store
near my house is closing up shop.
The last few days they’ve been selling
their entire stock, ten bucks per film.
Though I sometimes rented from them
I couldn’t bring myself to spend
ten dollars to own anything,
not a comedy, no thriller,
not even a monster movie.

The whole motion picture business
has metamorphosized but not
into a butterfly, instead
they’ve emerged from the chrysalis
of high-tech filmmaking combined
with modern business practices
as a junk shop—with junk shop wings,
junk shop abdomen, junk shop legs . . .

Hollywood has crafted itself
into an ugly butterfly.
I don’t want to buy their junk and
when I see them in my garden
I shoo them away from the flowers.






Motor cars, handle bars,
Bicycles for two.
Broken hearted jubilee.

Parachutes, army boots,
Sleeping bags for two.
Sentimental jamboree.

“Buy! Buy!”
Says the sign in the shop window.
“Why? Why?”
Says the junk in the yard.

Candlesticks, building bricks,
Something old and new.
Memories for you and me.

“Buy! Buy!”
Says the sign in the shop window.
“Why? Why?”
Says the junk in the yard.















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