of the broken shopping cart
serendipitously proceeded
from one green plastic
motherlode
to the next.
Its guide,
hidden beneath layers
that could have inspired
Escher’s genius at morphing,
was, however, more evocative
of Hieronymus Bosch.
He mined
each green trove assiduously,
adding nuggets of refundable treasure
carefully
to his creaking, wobbling chariot.
His acute accountant’s mind
kept a running total
in crisp, clean ledgers that,
alone, survived
the culture shock,
the corporate downsizing,
of the Nineteen Eighties.
