Trash and Otherwise

dead storefronts & deader buildings
junk stacked high in some
over the years

an entire forest rots away
in an old lumber yard
cut lumber stacked twenty-five
feet high left out in the rain

rusted automobiles fill a valley
& crawl up its sides
ten miles west on the highway

some people here look like
they haven't had a meal
in a week or a single thought
in a lifetime

the old man sits at his table
in the flea market with his
Confederate trinkets

he can't blame local decay
           on Yankees

"Neglect" Photograph by Laura Ferguson