by Zachary Daniel

Last night of the fair.
The livestock are packing
their suitcases for a journey
in the back of warm trailers.

The Ferris wheel, groaning,
lurches from its stanchions
and rolls into the darkness,
taking from each of its cabins
one long draught of bourbon.

East Wing of the assembly hall.
Antique toy soldiers
lost in the brightness
of industrial lamps.
One has a blue ribbon.
They all report to him.

Fat pumpkins loaded onto palanquins.
Kohlrabi push. Watermelons roll.
The dark tobacco sheaves bow
so low they fall
and are smoked.

Many hundred tracks of powdered sugar
the ants are mopping away.

The patriotic quilt quietly undoes
the seams on its patches
and drifts into the white mountainous
bed of Argentina.

2AM. The head supervisor arrives.
Her beam finds only the barren walls.
She has a kind of ceremonial key
which jingles as it unlocks nothing.

Zachary Daniel works as a gardener in Cave Hill Cemetery. He lives with his wife and cat in Louisville, Kentucky. He has poems published or forthcoming at The Pierian, Eunoia Review, Palette Poetry, Verse Daily, and elsewhere on the internet.