The front door creaks
its wooden frame
against the weight
of compulsions that spill past the threshold.
Goat trails cut from cartons
of mental attachments
masking shopping bags full
of under priced sale items
impossible to be ignored.
He explained the meticulous detail
that went into organizing the collected
artifacts.
She said that sometimes
it was easier to just walk
over things
then to find where they
belonged.
Larger piles consume smaller piles
and even larger piles flood over
iconographic logos
meant
to represent
the best for us all.
She picks through each
attachment
from dust-strangled figurines to past dated processed foods,
the smell of organic acids
fermenting the air.
He tells us how everything
has a purpose,
even if he hasn’t found what
the purpose may be,
its best to be prepared for
anything
this self-destructing world
could bring.
Meticulously manicured lawns
hide the abundance of cheaply made goods
sold under brightly lit signs
and well placed advertisements
promising enlightenment in a sale.
Sexual gratification in automated transactions.
He explained how many times
he had gone hungry
to buy the object of
affectionate necessity.
The given greater comfort.
He felt power,
he felt good,
it felt right
in buying what he wanted,
when he wanted it.
An unforgiving compulsion
feeds a ravenous addiction
A Promised Land mentality has spawned
a population beholden
to a bored apathy over the ignorance of need over
want.
Capitulating the fantasy
of a blessed land of milk
and honey,
provided by the righteousness of Commerce.
Manifest destiny evolves into vast
quantities
of plundered merchandise at below market prices
for self-defeating conveniences
granting us the one last Freedom
to buy what we want.
Hazmat teams enter toxic homes
built on the refuse
of a propagated desire
to be what you purchase.
The Capitalist
model feeds on itself by managing the illness in place of curing the sickness.
He can no longer discern the trash
that builds up within.
She has acclimated to breathing in the decay
from isolated corners where animals have gone
to die.
The listlessness over
material waste that collects in drifts and
mounds.
He’s no longer aware
of the scurrying scritch scratch of cockroaches
maneuvering through the atrophy of compostable
material.
The
fetid air condensates on your skin.
Health inspectors and state authorities
get calls from neighbors who fear
loosing their own property value.
Rescue
workers battle down doors searching through roomsto find survivorswho are unaware of their own catastrophe.
Victims of something they had no idea could happen.
It all crests on a wave of condemnable history
that ends up in dump trunks
headed towards new mountains
of landfills and contaminated wastelands,
of mentally compounded garbage,
excuses fraught with denial,
where packaging gets loosed
and caught on breezes,
on branches,
under fences
and in rivers.
