Love Canal
A product of concrete block
of glass
asphalt shingles
drywall
sand
A nice place to visit
slippery through the fingers
the trash collects
These materials revealing extraction
What had been taken from the earth, could it be returned?
The forms of energy required to making waste toxic
the water hot with spillage
the grass less green and dewy
than I remembered
Perhaps, we should reconsider the way we fill up the spaces we forget.
The body, a trash receptacle
a wind tunnel
that hurts often
a by-product of the petroleum industry
the gasoline lingers
a spot I want to bathe in
taste the spaces in the dark, disregarded
left in the municipal landfill
where old loves lay
contaminating ground water
and choking the air passages
making it difficult to drink
In the shallow space housing innocent actions
we are not innocent, you and I.
as the love canal covers your arms, ears, and fingers
fills up your nostrils to the eye sockets
you, a pile of waste I want to inhale
we suck up the gasoline through our nostrils
There is a flip side at the end of the world.
A place called “away” where we throw unwanted things.
I dream utopian of endless resources
where the water never ends.
A place where everything feels cherished and wanted.
