Pigs in the Ditches, Hummus in the Jam

I've hardly slept in days
so when asked
if I want sandwiches before
we hit the road
I say
Why not?

His house is as it should be
according to his stories
of politics at the county level.

An eleven year old boy
in the backseat
in the twilight
of the Minnesota summer
and in the ditches
are pigs and pigs,
piles of pigs
because the bottom has dropped out
of the pork market
and it is cheaper to shoot a pig
and throw it in a ditch

than to do anything else.

The old retarded couple
who live on five dollar payments
for the privilege of dumping
industrial waste in their
yard. The runoff is toxic.
But what can be done
about it? When there is

so much else to do?

Why not?
So he carries trays stacked high
with condiments through the cool
yard and in through the bug net
and we dine with parents.
The sickly pink traces in the hummus
are not signs of infection
but contamination by way of
a hummus and jelly sandwich.
Grilled cheese, burnt and squealed about,
and tomato soup, supplement
the talk of the decline of Sesame
Street. These days too much Elmo,
too much green screen.
Has it become
decadent? His mother wants to know.
Yes, yes, it is definitely decadent.
We laugh.

They've been watching an HBO series
and in the gilded maroon, crackley spined
history book find out
what will happen,
what has happened,
in Rome.