Ruth Z. Deming

Monday morning
leaf pickup
put your biodegradable
bags on the curb
stuff them with once
wondrous
green leaves
raked from the
littered lawn
think not of your own
mortality coming soon

On a nature walk
I crushed
some dangling dead
leaves with my hand
May death be as easy
and, yes, enjoyable
as sprinkling these
to the dry hungry
ground below.

The leaf pickup driver
looks out the window of his
shiny green truck –
“Who has something for me”
he thinks, as his men –
two young African-Americans
riding on the back like
tall charioteers
drift off in ecstasy
they feel the autumn
chill and remember when
their dad came home
from work
and pulled them down the
street in
the little red wagon.