Monday, November 22, 2010

Smoke and Boiler

They forklifted the old boiler out of the gym
and dumped it in the ash-pit. Every year
lush vegetation hung over it in summer.
Come fall, it resurfaced like an iron whale.

We sat half-awake against it and passed
a cigarette from hand to cupped hand.
The leaves overhead scattered the smoke
so no-one would find us cutting class.

Black residues dripped from the outlet valves
like India ink from an old pen's nib. We joked
that our lungs would look like that the day
that we fell over dead-- clunk!

The boiler breathed of death and rust,
rot and obsolescence. We smelled only smoke.

--words courtesy of Big Tent
Collection available! Knocking from Inside

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