In my youth,
in a cubby under the stairs,
there sat a big rag-bag.
Chaotically stuffed.
We’ve no rag-bag.
Our rags are store-bought:
laundered and folded.
Our cast off garments sit–
caked in dumpster chutney–
in a landfill.
Rag-pickers will scavenge them.
Some will be stuffed into craggy concrete holes.
There to keep the rats out.
The rats will make a nice meal of them.
And maybe a nest.
Some will rub rims clean–
if only for a monsoon moment.
Wiping, wiping–they’ll one day
dissolve into component threads.
By B Gourley in poem, Poetry on September 1, 2017.
