Ames Progressive

I.

He is an old brown mound of 700 pounds
Draped in a hospital blanket that falls upon
His slanting cliffs, his worn peaks, his damp hillsides
And folds down into the drainage ditch
Between two rolling foothills: his legs
This ditch has plastic pipes that drain the sewers beneath
A tube rises from the snow blanket
Like a ski-lift straight to the hole
Beneath the cleft of his chin, his round throat
He breathes, sort of
The tube is a wind-tunnel through a layer of sedimentary clay
The slabs of dark clay press upon his lungs
Rain comes to this mound in a sponge held by a cold hand
The rain won’t trickle into the dark crevasses and cracks
Without it
Bird-sounds, beep and cheep around him

The wind tunnel collapses
The mound quivers
The bird sounds cease their beeps and echo
One final, drawn out, cheep
And the sun shines upon
The forlorn mound, silent

II.

She is a bundle of cooling bread
Wrapped in a pink blanket
She rose in an oven
Her yeast fermented and bulged
Except in the center
She struggles to draw breath
A woman holds her
She is the woman’s perfect product
Made from the most excellent batter
Given warmth and time
And the secret ingredient–love, of course
With love the woman holds her bundle to the window
with mumble, mutter, and hum
Warm sun upon cooling bread
The sunlight shines long past her last breath