By Karen Weyant
You are too young to remember VHS tapes
and their Be Kind and Rewind warnings,
but at one time, employees here spent hours
doublechecking cases and tapes, making sure
every movie started at the beginning.
You know that in these times of Netflix, Hulu,
and Amazon Prime, your days here are numbered,
just like your fathers at the local factories where
hours and pay were cut slowly and painfully until
the doors finally closed. Still, you show up
every morning, clean out the overnight drop box,
and make coffee in the dusty backroom.
Still, you wander through long afternoons,
re-arranging B horror movies and women-in-peril flicks.
Still, you stay, looking forward to the regulars:
kids reeking with weed who buy handfuls
of candy bars, tired mothers who look for
a family favorite their children have not yet seen,
and the old man who always leaves the local bar
well before last call, beer on his breath
as he quotes John Wayne when he once again
rents the remake of True Grit. Creepy, some
say, but you know why he lingers here, his sourness
staining the air: this is what he knows,
and no one is waiting for him at home.
No comments:
Post a Comment