I crawled,
a gutter child,
curled in the
brown grease wrappings
of any and every
throw-away industry.
Teeth long black
from biting curbs,
a mumble I crawled
in only the
simplest of directions,
on hands swollen fat
like cities, necrosis black.

Every gutter flows
out to sea or sinks
into the rich brown lymph
of sodden Nature,
thumping.

Around me white
feet crashed colossal
fleeing every fleeting
second they couldn’t spend.
Dollars, white, run like
rivers, oil, crippling
white, whitening every
step, draining sterile
and pungent behind them.
The last one, crowned,
pulled a pubic cross
spotless and hollow,
like a coffin or a dream.

Dirt-eyed, I looked up.
But there was
no God, just
new trees,
towering.