In a town that smells like barbecue by Laura Navratil, a Poem

In a town that smells of barbecue
a hill smokes as early as eight in the morning.
White chuffs of meaty air
pour over the passersby in uniforms. They clutch lunch, waiting for the bus to top
the hill.

A train sears
thick southern air, clouds filled with meat,
the bus exhaust, the human
exhaust. The hills reply its whistle, a siren
call to elsewhere.

The trees' droppings
coat every surface with pollen. Pathless.
The wind shifts to bring the sound of the highway, asphalt-glazed.
New leaves click against dead ones.

Night-moths plink
off the bare bulbs of outdoor lights,
erratic wiring. They go out around midnight They go on
on their own.

At dawn, there was glass in the street.
All clear. Jars' and jars' worth,
the clipped shards for half a block.
A corridor of shards to collect and examine.

The dead roaches accumulate in a corner.
They must be swept up delicately with an old magazine page
or an envelope.
Each morning
the reminder of the poison coating the lining of the house.

Copyright 2007, Laura Navratil. © This work is protected under the U.S. copyright laws. It may not be reproduced, reprinted, reused, or altered without the expressed written permission of the author.

Laura Navratil is from Naperville, Illinois. She is currently an M.F.A. candidate at the University of Alabama, where she is an assistant poetry editor of Black Warrior Review.