Borrowing Time

Borrowing Time
by Brian Robinson
In the beginning, I borrowed from the
take a penny leave a penny dish.
An empty store and
velvet windows behind racks of yesterday’s Daily.
My wallet is empty;
       I spent it all on dollars.
“Pump 14,” I say,
       –it’s probably no. 3,
       that seems safer–
“No, that’s pump 00.”
Floodlit cases,
Feathers dot the ceiling in elliptical shadows
thrust by headlights in the velvet.
They run blue ink on the tile through
handicap signs.
In the meadow of green wrapper, blue foil,
I’m lost among the decks of pungent white sticks
filled with the same stuff those trucks pipe under the pavement.
“Have you heard?” says Zeus.
“Dennis is off to work,” I reply.
Wings in the glass, coffee warming twilight,
Slushed, electric beverage
has feet.
I’ll just have one.
I’m still a penny short.