"laundromat" poems
There is something magical
in the whirring
of a midday laundromat.
A cessation of pride,
maybe.
People all dressed in sweatpants
the air full of detergent smell
and the sound of coins clicking
against great tumblers
as they go round
and round
and round
and round...
The people smile back,
no use pretending superiority here.
Whistlers twitter on, folding towels and socks into neat, organized piles.
The children are well behaved,
their hands full of potato chips
given by their parents as a pittance for their patience.
The patient patrons
ponder on,
their empty hands crumpling receipts.
This, with the crunching of chips
and the distant whistle
over the percussion of clicking
coins clattering
in a dryer
compose an unintentional opera,
an ode to humility.
Humility's honorable honesty heals humanity's hubris.
Noisy trucks pass outside the floor-to-ceiling plate glass windows,
Where the hot air wreaks its violence
and men make their ways
in spite.
Oct 6, 2014
Oct 6, 2014 at 5:00 PM UTC
She was lost in East L.A.
She was told she could be found
That she’d feel something profound
Once she walked over the streets
Once she would smell, touch and hear
Once she read the signs
Admired the murals
And entered each Laundromat.
Jan 19, 2014
Jan 19, 2014 at 3:23 AM UTC
We'd bound around
For golf downtown
Frisbees always in hand
"The students are coming!!”
Was a seasonal refrain
As we’d goofily gallivant
Mother’s Day shows
We‘re free, mother-suckers
For your kids, a show we grant
A CLOWN SHOW!
A DOWNTOWN SHOW!
THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN’T!
Rock their world with juggling
See the Doctor for what ails
Rudi and O in laundromat land
Jeanie, Splash, Allison, Donna,
Silly girls astonishing with
Leaps, jokes and handstands
Chewey, Steamboat and Grog
"Yeah-yeah! Yeah-yeah!”
Silly boys grandstanding
All hail Papa Gale! We
Funned with Cpt. Plunge
Leader of the band!
Sweet Georgia!
**** croquet!*
It was grand!
**** croquet was the official lawn game of the Sweet Georgia Brown Clowns during the summer 198x Trinity Country tour [wherein we masqueraded as a Norwegian Salmon Kissing team at a Moose Lodge Talent Show in Lewiston, CA* {true!}]: “Don’t forget your hat!”)
*(we won)
Oct 6, 2018
Oct 6, 2018 at 9:11 PM UTC
There's a middle aged woman; she's dragging her feet.
She carries baskets of clothes to the laundromat
while the Mexican children kick rocks into the street;
and they laugh in a language I don't understand,
but I love them.
Why do I love them?
So the neighborhood is dimming as I smoke on the porch
and watch the people as they pass, enclosed by their cars;
on their faces just anger or disappointment.
I start wishing there was something I could offer them.
A consolation, what could I offer them?
And they are sad in their suburbs; robots water their lawn
and everything they touch gets dusted spotless,
and so they start to believe they've not touched anything at all
and the cars in the driveway only multiply.
They are lost in their houses.
I have heard them sing in the shower,
making speeches to their sister on the telephone
saying, "You come home.
Woman, you come here."
Don't stay so far away from me.
This weather has me wanting love more tangible.
Something I can hold 'cause it's getting cold.
I say, "Hold up our fists to the flame in the sky.
to block out the light that's reaching for our eyes."
'Cause it... 'cause it would blind us. Yeah, it will blind us.
Well, I've locked my actions in the grooves of routine.
So I may never be free of this apathy,
but I wait for a letter that is coming for me.
She sends me pictures of the ocean in an envelope
so there is still hope.
Yes, I can be healed.
There is someone looking for what I've concealed
in my secret drawer, in my pockets deep.
You will find the reasons I can't sleep and you will still want me.
But will you still want me? Will you still want...?
Well, I say come for the week.
You can sleep in my bed,
and pass through my life like a dream in my head.
It will... it will be easy. I will make it easy.
But all I have for the moment is a song to pass the time;
a melody to keep me from worrying.
Oh, some simple progression to keep my fingers busy,
and words that are sure to come back to me
and they'll be laughing, and they'll be laughing.
My mediocrity.
My mediocrity.
(and they'll be laughing.)
Sep 11, 2012
Sep 11, 2012 at 11:52 PM UTC
He's found himself in the closet
After he lost to himself in a game of tic-tac-toe
And tied his lobster bib tightly
Then hid his cheat sheet, for the pop quiz he knew was soon to come
It's curtains for her
She let the cat out of the bag
And now she's up **** creek with ****** for paddles to go **** herself with
Right in the birth canal
Then we'll auction off the ******
We'll pass them off as European defibrillators
Maybe some extremist will want them
If we spew out enough mindless dribble
The All Time Shit-Show is about to begin
We have
The Chronic Masturbater
The Hypochondriac
And The Pathological Liar
It was either sometime yesterday
Or sometime tomorrow
Or was it sometime today?
That you were all going to make fun of the boy with the cleft lip down at the laundromat?
Out of the three of you The Pathological Lair sticks out like a sore thumb
I can tell he was the runt of the litter
Who always bites off more than he can chew
I see the Hypochondriac has convinced himself he has eczema
He rattles off all his symptoms
Inordinate filibustering
Now there's the Chronic Masturbater
He looks like he's over the hill
He's only twenty one
But the blue circles under his eyes and the deep defined lines on his forehead denote his inelegant aging
I sign all your lives away in my horrible cursive
And now you belong to the ragtag trigger-happy posse of gun-jumpers
My billfold his happily filled
So I must go do some reconnaissance
Spy on those who have quit their day jobs
The fish out of water
You must find that thing that really rolls off the tongue with a nice ring to it
******
*******
*******
*******
No...
Go hang youself with dental flossed you home-schooled fool
Indentured servants we're just an after thought
Sep 7, 2014
Sep 7, 2014 at 4:27 PM UTC
On rising heat, killdeer flush
to decoy enemy--
threat to its young that roams too close
They rush to skim on hayish blur
wailing over wildflowers drying
Fretful twitter in perpetual flight
swifts-- twirl and hurl their bits of bodies--
debris
from a cumulonimbus of a late-day sky
toward a ridge of stag horn sumac
presuming horizon primordial
behind which time and city-- drift and wobble
on rising heat-- after rush hour
Rising Heat
Rising--
to meet my mind
on its way down
from my post behind
the laundromat
where I view it all--
rising--
where I usually go in search of quiet
to almost hear the ocean
two hundred miles away
to strain words from wind
in careless conversation
to wonder over
missed whispers....
But not today
In rising heat, I went down
in search of something better--
your eyes again
solvent for my presence of mind
dissolvers of hours and the order of things
But I need an excuse!
To turn, to trespass, to disturb the peace!
For your eyes again!
And still I need more-- being feverish, weak
Or?
Or... should I take the cure?
To deny ...To deny
To deny what?
Overtones from a sea of years?
I don't know! Whatever it was!
Nothing explain it...
I melt... I'm gone....
Aug 8, 2018
Aug 8, 2018 at 12:51 PM UTC
I find myself at the laundromat
Working out my thighs and lats
I put 2 quarters in the slot
It makes a sound like a robot
I open the door and I am posed
With a question asking, where are my clothes?
I don't wanna look stupid so I improvise
So I start chatting it up with a couple of guys
I say
Laundry for hire, laundry for hire
I'm looking for just the right buyer
Come on in, into my dryer
Laundry for hire, laundry for hire
One fine chap quickly agrees
Though I see him shaking at the knees
I ask him kindly to take out his keys
Don't worry kiddo this will be easy
He squeezes in, packed so tightly
I close the door feeling high and mighty
The machine rolls round and round
The door opens, and he falls to the ground
I feast on his entrails, meaty and sweet
Taking in the smell of his feet
I end my meal and am satisfied
Though I do wish he was deep fried
I feel a hunger still raging on
I still wish for it to be gone
So I say,
Laundry for hire, Laundry for hire
I'm looking for just the right buyer
Come on in into my dryer
Laundry for hire laundry for hire
Oct 31, 2014
Oct 31, 2014 at 4:39 PM UTC
Hymn to an Art-o-matic Laundromat
by Michael R. Burch
after Richard Thomas Moore’s “Hymn to an Automatic Washer”
O, terrible-immaculate
ALL-cleansing godly Laundromat,
where cleanliness is next to Art
—a bright Kinkade (bought at K-Mart),
a Persian rug (made in Taiwan),
a Royal Bonn Clock (time zone Guam)—
embrace my *** in cushioned vinyl,
erase all marks: **** vaginal,
****** inkspot, red wine, dirt.
O, sterilize her skirt, my shirt,
my skidmarked briefs, her padded bra;
suds-away in your white maw
all filth, the day’s accumulation.
Make us pure by INUNDATION.
Published by The Oldie, where it was the winner of a poetry contest. This poem was inspired by the incongruence of discovering "works of art" while doing laundry at a laundromat with coin-operated washers and dryers. I was reminded of the experience while reading Richard Moore’s “Hymn to an Automatic Washer.” Keywords/Tags: hymn, art, America, Americana, laundry, laundromat, washer, dryer, appliances, clean, cleaning, cleanliness, clothes, clothing, underwear, god, godly, godliness, water, baptism, inundation, sonnet, analogy, humor
Nov 28, 2021
Nov 28, 2021 at 11:50 PM UTC
Pay your quarters
pay your dimes
you're paying for laundromat time
slowly spinning
forgotten
by
Einstein's Theory of Relativity.
Minutes become hours
and
there are still too many hours to go.
Any math class
intense gas
organized religion
waiting for the tow truck,
the bus
in
the pouring frozen rain.
Sitting in the E.R.
with a cut finger
waiting waiting waiting.
Sitting in the hospital room
with an elderly distant relative
you hardly know,
their funeral too.
At the grandparents house
with endless repeats of Judge Judy
on the t.v.
t.v. droning monotoning on and on and on.
Any work day
perpetually two thirty or three,
in meetings with presentations
with more presentations to go,
you're trying to be productive,
but all you know
is
laundromat time
slowly spinning.
Any night of insomnia,
betrayals endless loops,
anxiety rolling through,
following you from one cigarette to another
three o'clock
four o'clock
four-twenty.
Home movies of endless barbeques
I know meaningful to you.
Pictures of people's
cats and dogs
a hundred more to go.
Eight and a half months pregnant,
kiddie soccer on a Sunday morning at 7:30,
the middle school brass band
Friday night at nine,
yes, that's me
passed out and snoring,
laundromat time
a warm blanket
has
put me under.
Anybody else's endless fascinations
say
pictures of weather,
laundromat time sets in
as the
eye lids flutter
narcolepsy sets in with all of this clutter.
So the next time
you're standing in line
and the woman in front is telling
the clerk
every detail you never wanted to know
you'll think about these poor lines
and remember
you're spinning in laundromat time
forgotten by Einstein.
In fact these poor lines
must be feeling that way too
I am going to do you a favor
and
get back to you later.
Dec 28, 2014
Dec 28, 2014 at 10:54 AM UTC
Caught the vampire's failing smile,
cracked by teeth & venom,
wind-walking among the trees,
talking to the vipers
& the rats & the bats & the
men of the old bonetown.
Mr Mann had the right idea,
burn your books & get the hell outta Dodge.
Do not pass go & do not stop,
do NOT make out in the back of a beat-up old auto
parked next to the hypermarket on Dawn & Vine.
Mr Mann up front,
peering through the cracks in the windscreen,
the cracks in reality.
He can see the vampire's slow smile,
the shadows passing across the face of the TV screen,
& hear the old ghost voices,
the old radio voices, the 1949 voices.
Blood on leather,
black roots rising,
saliva on after-effects & after-echoes,
the apocalypse riders chasing the moon up the old dark valley,
the moon chasing the apocalypse riders right back
down the old dark valley to whatever hell they came from.
The vampires! The vampires!
Children beat hasty retreats,
hide under the boxes back of the laundromat,
not daring to peek
as black boots crunch gravel.
Mr Mann has the right surmise,
get outta the books & into guns,
get into heavy metal & iron drag,
get into lead & something magickal,
long forgotten lore & hoodoo voodoo
from years & years ago.
The vampire's smile turns awful yellow,
fades as the stars wheel & that tired old sun begins its ascent,
fades as the dawn breaks over the desert winds & cacti
& the lovers wake in their motel room in the back of beyond
& fumble for their stakes & knives & garlic *****
Easy now for Mr Mann in the sun-kissed big blue.
Hunt it down in the tumbledowns & old desert towns.
Kick off the jams, break open the locks.
Hose it down with oil & strike a match.
Burn the reality right off that face
& that face right off reality
Splat on the sand. Grue on the sand. Black on the sand.
Mr Mann walking back to the autombile, back to happiness,
radio playing a little something from 92,
or was it 93, he really can't remember now.
Feb 20, 2012
Feb 20, 2012 at 3:16 PM UTC
Smells like clean clothes
it's always pleasant
at the laundromat
down the street from
my apartment.
The washer and dryer
are currently broken
looks like some teenager
didn't know what they were doing
as the washer is filled with water
and their clothes remain
inside dwelling to smell
of mildew.
The dryer looks like an antique
because it is the slime green of the 70's
mismatched to it's wifley counterpart
that is stainless steel sparkles
so I assume the dryers death
is not the fault of our fresh water culprit
but electrical problems brought on
from existing forever.
They broke a few months ago
and I've never gone to check
if they were brought back to life
as I've found myself
intoxicated with the laundromat.
It's the mechanical hums
an orchestra of ball barrings
with clothes tumbling
through their fabric softeners
to become fresh gentle cottons
the smell of Hugs
is the aroma of heaven.
Jan 13, 2016
Jan 13, 2016 at 6:27 PM UTC
We waded knee deep in the puddles
of vacant lots when the flood filled
our gutters to the brim.
When the rain died down and the water pulled
itself from the streets we watched the rainbow
of oil swirl around our ankles,
walked the wooden footbridge that broke
apart under the weight of our feet,
the water-logged wood rot
splitting while rusted nails slid
out of place. We followed the streams
back to the plaza, back to fake IDs
and the ash-stained tobacco shop.
We found ourselves under flickering
lights, leaning against the rusted
siding of the family market, faces hidden
in a mask of smoke. We got lost
in the electric hum of the laundromat's cyclic drone.
They paved over it all -- covered freckled
skin with cloth and hot tar,
crushed vacant houses like hollow skulls,
ignited neon lights and street lamps,
strip malls and drugs stores
that burn holes into old hiding places.
They still try to sift through shattered glass,
silence the hiss of the popped bike tire,
wipe away the blood flower that blooms
from my scabbed knee.
Mar 24, 2011
Mar 24, 2011 at 10:29 AM UTC
On rising heat, killdeer flush
to decoy the enemy--
threat to its young that roams too close
They rush to skim on hayish blur
wailing over wildflowers drying
Fretful twitter in perpetual flight
swifts-- twirl and hurl their bits of bodies--
debris
from a cumulonimbus of a late-day sky
toward a ridge of stag horn sumac
presuming horizon primordial
behind which time and city-- drift and wobble
on rising heat-- after rush hour
*Rising Heat
Rising--
to meet my mind
on its way down
from my post behind
the laundromat
where I view it all--
rising--
where I usually go in search of quiet
to almost hear the ocean
two hundred miles away
to strain words from wind
in careless conversation
to wonder over
missed whispers....
But not today
In rising heat, I went down
in search of something better--
your eyes again
solvent for my presence of mind
dissolvers of hours and the order of things
But I need an excuse!
To turn, to trespass, to disturb the peace!
For your eyes again!
And still I need more-- being feverish, weak
Or?
Or... should I take the cure?
To deny ...To deny
To deny what?
Overtones from a sea of years?
I don't know! Whatever it was!
Nothing explain it...
I melt... I'm gone....*
Sep 8, 2017
Sep 8, 2017 at 10:51 AM UTC
The flicker of a bulb lights the rearview mirror.
A car stands motionless behind the laundromat.
The occupants make hollow love,
Searching for what is lost in the sea of humanity
And the localized cloud of buildings.
Their bodies curl in the back seat
And the streetlamp continues,
A silent metronome, blinking on
And off.
Oct 17, 2011
Oct 17, 2011 at 9:27 PM UTC
I'm not yankin' your chain, pullin’ the wool over your eyes, or any of that ****
This is the job man.
Fly a plane, build a bridge, climb a mountain- do it man. Don't limit yourself.
Unless you’re not that adventurous guy, I mean, that's cool. No inner drive to be outgoing: That's cool, that's cool, I get it, stay with us… work at the Laundromat. There are so many benefits to a Laundromat. Good… well decent money. Not much real work, we operate machines, so whatever really. But the chillest part is, we get to see the creepy stains people have on their clothing... and have a good laugh behind their backs.
These stains tell stories.
Pilots are sweaty under their arms. This tells me they are confined, cramped, caged, we are free in our own little Laundromat world.
Bridge builders have industrial stains; no regular old machine will get those out. We are chillin’ working for the same pay they are at a quarter of the effort. Hikers are even worse. They are soaked head-to-toe in sweat for a view from a postcard- idiots.
It may not be as stimulating as flying a plane; as as helpful as building a bridge; as monumental as hiking a mountain; but it’s the superiorly important.
We are doing the world a huge service. Without us, there would be no uniforms for pilots, no clothes for the bridge builder, and no hiking gear for the mountain man.
Buck up, life could be worse, you could be a more useless guy with creepy stains who flies a plane- builds a bridge- or hikes a mountain and then overpays us at the Laundromat to clean his clothes.
Jun 18, 2013
Jun 18, 2013 at 9:23 PM UTC
On rainy days
I look up poems set in Seattle,
then look back at the rain set against the window
I imagine the water was carried here
from the shores of their bay
across Pike Place, through Belltown,
in buckets they use
to carry Pacific salmon off fishing boats,
or in lidded Styrofoam bowls used
to take out clam chowder
I practice walking in this manner, sans umbrella, through the parking lot of a South Florida strip mall.
When I reach the 24-hour Dunkin Donuts, past the laundromat and the check cashing store, I channel my inner Seattleite: poised in wet socks,
unrushed as the sips they take from their mugs when its **** pouring outside
I renounce sugary accoutrements and have what they're having:
Black coffee with a splash of rain,
A balance perfected on their slanted hill streets
that breed more poets per capita
than anywhere else in the country
Vegas can have its mirages in the desert
San Francisco, its gold bridge
I think I should just have this coffee,
and this rainy day
as the poem it is.
Aug 24, 2017
Aug 24, 2017 at 10:58 AM UTC
I had a dream last night that I put you
in danger
that you were hurt because of
me
is that why you left?
please please
i need you
i need you 1 am fresh presto after
castro movies
i need you orange juice and dark ***
forget me nots and tangents
forget me not how can you forget me so
faster moving you must
i miss you reggae and sunshine
freckles and flakiness
i can't do this without you
acoustic guitar in laundromat
halloween princess
hiding away and scaring me for years
come back cooking
and
japanese tea garden explorer
and keep exploring with me
come back wanderer
you have made a home within my heart
you must not part.
Jul 8, 2013
Jul 8, 2013 at 2:45 AM UTC
I never noticed until now
Detroit is a real town
Thru a puddle, I go
Past the shuttered laundromat
The charcoal stump colonials
Carnivorous ivy
Strangling the
Rustbolt cars lining the
Pothole roads that I never noticed
Until now, Detroit is a real town
At the corner of Rosa Parks Dr.,
A rotting moonlight and gasoline aroma
A damp liquor store and a bus-stop
sign,
6 ghosts linger around the metal post
Like silvery mothra ,
Clinging at night to an outdoor light
The saviour stop.
For tiffany spirits
With expressionless faces.
Two phantom headlights manifest
Out of the indescribable looming night
And park at the sign
The ghosts faint
Thru the double doors
Of one rickety, dutiful citybus
The tailpipes dripping wil-o'-the-wisp
As it proceeds out of my view
Into dark night shade.
.
Dec 28, 2012
Dec 28, 2012 at 12:52 AM UTC
*I take a deep breath into my nose
to smell the freshness of clean sheets.
Aw yes, I love that smell,
that warm fresh scent,
that crisp air smell.
There's nothing else that can compare,
to the smell of fresh clean sheets
it's an aroma I will never forget.
I remember when I was a kid,
my mother took me to the laundromat
to clean my sheets.
I couldn't believe the smell,
how I loved that smell,
my mom couldn't get me to leave.
We watched TV while the cloths were turning
around and around,
but I stared at the machine
when my mom put in my bedsheets.
I knew when they were through
I would be in heaven smelling the clouds.
I love clean sheets.*
© By Amanda Shelton
Jun 18, 2017
Jun 18, 2017 at 10:19 PM UTC
Do you find it
boring
to spell out the word
"subconscious"?
Not the way I spell it.
Many step onto the first "S"
as if it were
a ***** rain puddle,
but I'm sufficiently alert
and can see that one must dive
into the word's application,
nimbly rummage through the
annals of its history
before conducting one word
in or against its favor.
Glide downward
through the
rhythmically breathing curves
of the voluptuous prefix,
"sub-",
as you begin
dreaming
further
down
towards the comatose
of the rickety construction
that is your superego,
to the "you"
no one knows about
in clear daylight
(even the mirror).
Minor turbulence
may occur
within the rest,
"-conscious",
just a few jagged rocks
stirred into Cloud Nine
to alter your perceptions
like a face hit by a bus.
This is the meat of your matter,
the acidic ruptures
that only the most cunning
infiltrators
can identify and nudge
with their index fingers
using a painful precision,
the ***** band of undergarments
that always seem to loiter behind
in the town laundromat.
But a jagged rock
is a jagged rock,
never eternally bordering
the outline of the planet,
just lodged within the corners
of your comfort zone,
their presence
a necessary evil
for the times you must steer
through the swarms of cataracts
and endure the exrcuciating agony
of becoming a better human being.
You launch yourself
from your adolescent crutches
like the roots of teeth
erupting from the base of the jaw
and prevent single definition,
hack away the tentacles
of emotional paralysis,
by remembering to mend
the tear between
two polar halves,
"sub
conscious."
Under your false promises,
your Freudian timeline,
your ever-quivering Id...
every single one of you.
Apr 29, 2010
Apr 29, 2010 at 10:53 AM UTC
Someone’s at the Laundromat
with a few bolts of currency jingling in their pocket
and a bright red shopping cart
made of holes and heavy plastic.
An empty machine running on suds
churns the lottery squeaky clean.
The price of wishes
faithed in the Lucky Charms of Loose Change,
is printed on leftover tags on old clothes
on sloped shoulders that have
just enough gumption to
fling coins
into the
wishing well.
May 9, 2013
May 9, 2013 at 11:47 PM UTC
He was last spotted
With his gnarled hands
making love to his pockets
maybe bearing a child
half palm
half cotton
Every so often
he’d flail the lint
from his fingernails
serrated from his spleen,
knot them up
into steely ***** of yarn
and batter the window
of his sister’s room
His knuckles may have suffered
some trauma
but it’s likely now
they speak in scars
with windbag bones
that don’t shut up
He isn’t a looker
His nose is large
and barbed
like wire
with currents
that breathe in pollen
he’s allergic to
He got inked last March
on his eighteenth
shrouding his flaxen leg hairs
in ****** red roses,
a wide mouthed skull
with an inverted cross
bludgeoning its left temple,
and the words
“Here’s to your destiny”
in all caps
He has a mop
of tow colored hair
and narrow eyes
either a robin’s egg
or air force blue
that I once piloted
He’s a well padded
five feet and nine inches
But I picture him
far rounder
You’ll never see him
well kempt
he smells of minced cattle
and marijuana
He could dissolve you
into laughter
even on unlit nights
when the moon
goes to the cleaners
and the stars
swish around
in the Laundromat
with your knickers
His grin was cloying
like syrup
until his teeth stuck together
in a wonted pout
Don’t keep your eyes peeled
You won’t find his face
on a milk carton
This boy isn’t really missing
He’s out there somewhere
studying chemistry
or law
But he isn’t here
to give me hell
anymore
So I picture his calf,
his immutable tattoo
whispering
“Here’s to your destiny”
and hope I still have one
Jun 6, 2015
Jun 6, 2015 at 1:18 AM UTC
Dear Mr. Television,
There are poor air quality in national parks.
Californians are painting their lawns green.
A ****** Galactic pilot survived failed space mission for billionaire.
Santa Cruz lost an 8 year old and found her dead in a recycle bin.
Berkeley police in riot gear hunted a man with silver teeth for robbing laundromat.
Jamestown archaeologists found first American settler remains.
LA mayor second guessed Olympic games.
SF sign said "hold it!" to keep urination off public domains.
LA police handed out "quality of life" citations to homeless people.
Opinions urged citation clinics for the "service resistant".
Others said it's all in vain without any housing.
Mexico made Presidential candidate Donald Trump into piñata,
but the people have taken enough swing at him already.
Your pal,
Newspaper
Sep 7, 2015
Sep 7, 2015 at 6:14 PM UTC
The laundry mat, a necessary evil,
If you have no washer or drier,
That's where you go.
Clink clang, quarters fall out of the change machine
Only to be taken by the washers and dryers
In and out, people being loud
They come inside and then leave
Beep beep beep
Buzz, buzz, buzz
Washers and dryers crying out to be switched or
Started up again.
Heavy baskets of laundry are transported from place
To place.
Someone always leaving a sock or a pair of underwear behind,
Later curious as to where it went.
Many don't understand why people use the place
But when you are poor or don't have a place to put
A washer or a dryer, that is the loophole in the world of
Washer dryer ownership.
Jun 1, 2013
Jun 1, 2013 at 11:16 AM UTC
Doing laundry at night
A place down the street from me
In between a liquor store and a save-a-lot foods
Eyes buried in a new poetry book
and the washing machine’s timer
In my periphery
A little blonde girl sits next to me
And says very clearly,
“I wish someone had a quarter
For some candy”
She opens every metal spout
Tries every blocky butterfly key
Repeats herself, repeats herself, repeats herself,
She is with two men who keep calling her over
Until they don’t notice
And she comes to me again
This time her hand to her ear
Whether there really is a phone there
I can’t tell
She says,
“Yeah mommy
I really just want a quarter for some candy
Uncle J won’t give me one
And daddy isn’t listening
I wish you could have stayed in San Diego longer
I miss you already
Can you tell daddy to give me a quarter?
Are you coming back soon?
Mommy
I still want to talk to you
Just a quarter
Just a minute
Don’t hang up
K?”
I know this is barely halfway between Halloween and Christmas
I also know how long that sweetness really lasts
Not nearly long enough
And as supplies dwindle
It all becomes bitter
I leave a few quarters on the bench where I was sitting
Act like I don’t notice they fell out of my pocket
She acts like she doesn’t notice them there
We watch each other like adults watch the washing machine timers
So no one steals their property when they ding
I leave
And she does whatever she does
And that sweetness
Never lasts
Dec 23, 2011
Dec 23, 2011 at 7:10 AM UTC