I drive into the parking lot<\/p>\n
of the probation office.<\/p>\n
I am not going to write a poem<\/p>\n
about the experience today<\/p>\n
or ever again.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Wind billows the American flag,<\/p>\n
naturally at half mast,<\/p>\n
perpetually at half mast.<\/p>\n
Just keep it there<\/p>\n
and turn it upside down.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I survey the vehicles in the lot:<\/p>\n
meth rigs and a pickup camper<\/p>\n
with a homemade red, white and blue paint job,<\/p>\n
jury rigged with duct tape and baling wire.<\/p>\n
Living upside down,<\/p>\n
at half mast.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Time to go in.<\/p>\n
I bring along Leaves of Grass<\/i>.<\/p>\n
I put my right hand on it<\/p>\n
and swear I won’t write a poem.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A man bums smokes<\/p>\n
A woman plays Angry Birds<\/p>\n
A man hides in a hoodie<\/p>\n
A woman fidgets<\/p>\n
I hear a man say he has a 1:00 appointment.<\/p>\n
He has no idea what time it is.<\/p>\n
He has the wrong day, too.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The man now offers to buy a cigarette.<\/p>\n
The woman takes him up.<\/p>\n
He fishes out change.<\/p>\n
They go outside.<\/p>\n
I check her face: surface of the moon.<\/p>\n
I check his face: faceless.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Sterility. The humming. The inertia.<\/p>\n
I feel myself becoming the gray carpet.<\/p>\n
I crack open Walt<\/p>\n
to glean some life.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Rain begins to collide<\/p>\n
against the windows.<\/p>\n
The talk moves toward rain.<\/p>\n
Two men describe it as \u201cpissing.\u201d<\/p>\n
The talk moves toward pissing,<\/p>\n
into cups, beakers, tubes,<\/p>\n
and training their minds<\/p>\n
and bodies for the UA.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
We go inside the room.<\/p>\n
I hear:<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m living under a bakery.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m journaling instead of drinking.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI need one good day.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m almost out of pills.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
When you hear a man say,<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m living under a bakery,\u201d<\/p>\n
how can you not write a poem?<\/p>\n
Or whatever this is.<\/p>\n
I swear it’s the last one,<\/p>\n
until the next one.<\/p>\n
(If you found this post enjoyable, thought provoking or enlightening, please consider supporting a writer at work by making a financial contribution to this blog or by purchasing an NSP book.) <\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I drive into the parking lot of the probation office. I am not going to write a poem about the experience today or ever again. Wind billows the American flag, naturally at half mast, perpetually at half mast. Just keep it there and turn it upside down. I survey the vehicles in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3397,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,42],"tags":[469,52,190,88,253,364,470,256],"class_list":["post-3396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-meditations","category-poetry","tag-leaves-of-grass","tag-oregon","tag-oregon-poetry","tag-poetry","tag-probation","tag-probation-poem","tag-probation-poetry","tag-walt-whitman","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3396"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3399,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3396\/revisions\/3399"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}