Note on the Pavement
Steve Garland reads the works of Ricki Shiers
Note on the Pavement
Note on the Pavement
walking home I found a piece of paper so crippled
that her ink was partially invisible. out of curiosity and reluctancy
to arrive home to my uncaring habitat, I picked up and search it for evidence of anything
I was automatically enamored by whoever drew the portraits
that person, I imagine, wears their thrift store shoes with laces like unbound snakes
and a jacket so dirty that it is a gradient of brown and blue
this child, however, is the kind to spend their entire day scribbling on pieces of paper,
losing their self in between the lines to put a brickwall between their self and the parental neglect
that they believe anyone and everyone receives.
The picture this person wrote is so distorted and uniform that it
is symbolic and practically the embodiment of childhood itself
the crooked heart in the center of the squaretriangle
house has a small crack
that seems so large I could write this poem in it more than once.
the attic is empty except what appears to be a string, probably swaying back and forth
like the young artist’s shoelaces when they are running outside to play on the cement
by the parking lots
I’m happy to know that the artist left their name off so I never know them and never have to
meet them, and I can now live with my own thoughts of who they may be. I can live with the
ideas and galleries they framed in my mind, and I never have to ask them, what I thought
the whole time: “hi, how are you”.
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