the hunt

This poem came out of a Poetry Xfit event with SAFTA. They happen once a month and are free and fun and hard. I always leave them feeling like I stretched and pushed. You should check it out some time!

The poem here is one of so many stories I have about my fascination with yard sales and thrift stores and junk piles, and my small, sticky paws.

When I was younger, I thought every key unlocked

A mystery    Wonder

I collected them (by which I mean

I stole them          from everyone and everywhere

They belonged, I believed, to the quest,

To the seekers)

There was potential     intrigue   in the mundane

I would dig my old sand shovel into the fresh

Soil of my parents’ garden

Upend the pansies, unearth the mums

In search of buried secrets

I longed for the dull clunk of yellow

Plastic against a lockbox

Old wood

A hand, greying fingers grasping       at nothing

Among the roots

I buried clues of my own making — yard

Sale trinkets I bought with borrowed quarters

Items swiped off the basement shelves

I was sure no one       would miss

If you asked me about it now, I wouldn’t

Know        what to tell you

All I seem to have       these days

Is the furry animal of my upside-down temerity

Like I arranged my confidence    on a serving tray and     stumbled

On the stairs, jostling the contents,

The colors mixed     and blurred     a murky green

Like it could have been     anything

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xo, Priscilla