By J. Scott Hardin
The other night, I took my girl to walmart.
Actually it was a superwalmart.
As far as I can tell,
the only difference is
the super version is open all night.
She was off finding some furry blue crap,
material to make an antifashionable purse.
Older Mexican women opened boxes and waxed floors
and otherwise performed the wary dance of immigrants
before a captive audience of surveillance cameras.
I got bored of the aisles
of yarn and cloth and sparkling do-dads,
so I went to the can. Beep.
Unknown criminals had recently set fires
in some of these bathrooms.
Three stores had been all over the local news.
I scanned the ceiling,
wondering who was watching
and from what little peep-hole.
Beep. Blip. Ding. Whirl.
A deformed penis has been scratched into the wall,
urinating a spray of keyed lines onto a Swastika.
Block lettering spelled out the message:
KILL WHITEY. Blip-beep.
Beep. Ding. Whirl-beep. Blip. Beep-beep.
Doubtless the cleaning crew would be in soon.
The Monster never lacks of fresh paint.
Ding. Whirl-beep. Ding. Blip.
Soon they’ll come to scrape and cleanse and paint,
and otherwise perform the wary dance of immigrants
before a captive audience of —
Beep. Ding. Blip-blip. Beep.
“That noise,” I thought.
Distant and sanitized,
the record of scanned goods
seeped through the walls and into the stalls.
Every scan brings it’s bit of profit,
money to the Monster,
money to the board and ceo,
money to the executives and managers, and,
trickling down by infinitesimal pittance,
money to the wary dance of immigrants,
along the aisles and into the toilets.
Beep. Whirl-ding. Blip. Beep.
And I am the captive audience.
Whirl-beep. Ding.
And it’s not just this store either.
It’s stores by million and beeps by infinities.
HOW beep ding whirl-beep
Ding bleep beep beep CAN
Beep A whirl-beep
Ding bleep bleep MAN ding
Bleep ANY beep
Beep-whirl LONGER blip-beep
HAVE ding whirl-ding ding
Whirl-ding whirl whirl whirl A
Ding SINGLE whirl-ding whirl
Bleep-ding DECENT beep-beep
Beep THOUGHT beep
Monster. Immigrants. ? Beep. Wary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Flush.
Clutching at Straws 