Prose Poem on an Empty Stomach

I sit amid the popcorn scent of urine
and listen to the man with the mechanical ear
and wonder, am I that unscrupulous?

Today I am a paper sack
filled with bean-ends and carrot-tops,
wilted flower-clippings discarded,
and every week I trade myself in
for a whole turnip. Today I am
the poor mother of a blissful child,
chasing the stale American dream
of tending my own fertile garden
without burying my own seed.

Today I can steal. I have no guilt
or shame, except to hide my spoils,
to keep them from prying eyes, from maggots,
to use them before they can be reclaimed.
I can slip trifles into tiny pockets
because no one would fault her, angel-eye, doeskin
but her hands are busy with other mischiefs.
I am the jackdaw, the magpie, the mouse in the grain.

Tomorrow—is there tomorrow? Will
I ever come to the day with a fresh face
and no longer stoop like a widow in the field?

Should I come to that cliff's-edge
where flowers arc with careless grace
and eyes begin to trace my whirligig path,
would I change?
Are my ways desperate or destined?
Am I exposed in my weakness, or weakened by exposure?
I resolve, I resolve, but with resolution so poor
(so, so poor...) I take take take
and wonder why, and why, and mostly how
but there's nothing more to ask
and I just need a little time, a little touch
to flavor this goddamned turnip.