CHAINS OR, THE NECESSITY OF SAMIZDAT

by G. Tod Slone

A Borders Experience

Free WiFi, so I bring in my laptop,
hook it up and buy a coffee, sip,
and recharge my battery.
Later, I get up to stretch my legs,
walk across the long space
to hunt for the poetry section.
The religion section is quite ample
—three huge wall-to-ceiling shelves—
same goes for the fiction section,
where I spot right in the middle
a small island stand marked Poetry.
So I walk over to it, and as I reach,
a lone elderly lady farts a gurgler.

Damn, I decide to skip the poetry
before the waft engulfs me.


Bums Don’t Carry Laptops

In the morning, I get out of the
sleeping bag in the back
of my two seater, crawl up to the
driver’s seat, sit, start the car,
then drive out of the mall lot
on down to Barnes & Noble,
where I escalator upstairs
to take a dump and
wash my hands and face,
then find a seat off in a
solitary corner and write:

Bums don’t carry laptops
or maybe they do.
I carry a laptop…