Trevor Moffa
Always, hopefully, soon
Look at the Shell station,
gasless and cold,
the paint, like everything else,
pulling away, hungry for distance
and full of wind and loss once sated.
A shuttered truck stop
with signs a mile in each direction
still promising rest and yesterday's prices,
disappointed by rust, watching investment speed
past the weed cracked concrete foundation
behind a fence
and a for sale sign in disrepair.
Rust is hope having outlived reason,
the park in disrepair,
the fence around the park in disrepair,
the lock on the fence around the park in disrepair.
My whole life the miles long factory
a reddish ruin of metal not worth scrapping
and a disconnected segment of train track
on a weed cracked concrete foundation
behind a fence
and a for sale sign in disrepair.
People talk about money like they talk about memory,
and they don't talk about rust.
It's miserable stuff for conversation.
We sit at a hot dog shop with a reddish awning
under pictures of menus from the 1930s
when the same $3.00 dog cost a nickel
and talk about how once upon a time
there were more millionaires per square mile
a couple blocks over than anywhere else in America,
and the kids half listen because they're old enough
to know a mansion
from Blockbuster’s weed cracked concrete foundation
behind a fence
and a for sale sign in disrepair.
Rust is the bust after the boom,
hope having outlived the perceived value of hope,
the cockroach and the Twinkie at the end of it all.
For a dozen years a yellow sign with red letters
has promised, WAFFLE HOUSE COMING SOON,
and relatives from out of town,
or the lost who get off the exit looking for gas, will
misinterpret the weed cracked concrete foundation
behind a fence
and a for sale sign in disrepair,
and ask, When’s the Waffle House open?,
and I expect the reply is always, hopefully, Soon.
Laurel Anderson
Lauren Camp
Tina Cane
Willa Carroll
Charles K. Carter
Donna Castañeda
T. Clear
Barbara Daniels
Merridawn Duckler
Denise Duhamel
Cal Freeman
Majda Gama
zakia henderson-brown
Jessica Jacobs
Elizabeth Kuelbs
Michael Lauchlan
Tamara J. Madison
Jennifer Martelli
Abby Minor
Trevor Moffa
Caridad Moro-Gronlier
Stephanie Niu
Katherine Page
Iain Haley Pollock
Hannah Rodabaugh
Michael Rogner
Adrie Rose
Carole Symer
Carolyne Wright