Fred Aiken Writing

pallets upon pallets 

stacked across the horizon,

each bearing a load that has no name,

each hoping to be shipped to a lovely house

at the end of the cul-de-sac,

where a Victorian stucco house sits

atop a hill with no one at home,

to be delivered another day,

still no one answers,

to be delivered another day,

pastel streams of jet fuel floating over the sky,

harkening in a new age 

of next day,

another day,

delivery,

but no one is home,

to be delivered, yet again, another day

with everything sanitized,

all the pieces put back in their respective places,

a harmony playing in the background,

knowing the order of it all will not last,

not in this place,

not at this time,

but a dimension exists where it’s always clean,

not a single worry about microorganisms invading

and microbial battles occurring all around

because it’s all been swept away,

harvested by the guys in the hazmat suit,

strolling by as they drag each corpse

to their respective place

the world smells like coffee dust 

swimming in the back of the throat 

as I try to catch my breath

in the cold air that punctures

and stabs,

with a lack of a hold,

the quickness to it all settles,

escape among the free doesn’t exist,

because it’s already there