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Friday, December 18, 2009

POTATO CONSCIOUSNESS

by Bob Muir


I came by a potato
and thought some…

on the Irish who bore
their homes across the pond,
and Van Gough’s Potato
Eaters, sharing their harvest,
in communal hardship.
Where famine
caused a revolution.
Really, who was it that said,
“ let them eat cake.” ?

And then,
because we need to know,

The paper prints:

The missing five year old
given up to prostitution,
by her mother,
has been found dead.

Thank God for that.

and the news broadcasts:

that a man on I-95 crashed
into a sign today and ran
up the embankment.
Then to finish the job
he jumped back into
the morning commute.

Was he hungry too?


Bob Muir was born in Boston, raised in NYC, and later returned to New England, and has been a resident of Providence RI for the last 30 years. He retired from the Providence Police force after twenty years of service. Bob is bilingual-Spanish and writes poetry in both English and Spanish.
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