E471

“Now serving E468, at station number 5.”

Male pattern baldness in unbuttoned

red, mindfully picking his nose.

Blond, stickish, twitchy boy, filled

with juice like a grasshopper, breaks

free of bickered carpool spats.

Fitful child & sleep-withheld mother, nodding

like tongues of a grandfather clock. Silence

is slow to fill the space of tears. Green tea,

an absence of cellophane—her number is up.

Manila & thumbs scrolling, there is an anxious

odor rising from the shuffling ranks. Here

we all sit in grotesque drudgery; us

ticket-holding, DMV Americans.

& last in line is the disheveled burnout.

Gold, 1999 Tacoma man, expired license

& tags. Expired man, overdue mind, burnt

as alder ash or a lesser cord: Loblolly.

3 hours, he poems away in the back, thinking

“I see the world for what it is.” But they’ve

got the poet pegged. “Now serving E471.”