michael Hawkes - Plastic Rapt

I need food for supper
on this cold November day,
I put petrol in the limousine
and drive to IGA,
reputedly a good marche
a good three city blocks away.

Ten olives in a plastic pot
a mere five bucks'll buy the lot
ten thin slices of salami
in a tray of styrofoam
so quaint folk from Italy
may leave their knives at home
and cheeses sliced up ready
in case you are spastic
heading for a picnic
on a flying plastic carpet
And lest I'm being too sarcastic
there's a freshly baked baguette
in a tailored plastic bag
stiffened up in such a way
the skinny loaf can't sag
and a lettuce in a plastic box
that's big enough for all my socks
It really is fantastic
how soon I lose my appetite
'cos every edible thing in sight
is double wrapped in plastic
the berries, brocoli and peas
are wrapped in ones and twos and threes
in gloss with labels aimed to please
there's not a peach or plum to squeeze
they're all wrapped up in plastic.

With packages in a plastic cart
and venom in my toxic heart
I wheel towards a plastic smile
and strain to stay elastic while
I can't see a thing that's funny
I pay the smile with plastic money

At home with scissors, secateurs and saws
I set about the plastic wraps
feeling sick, sick and sicker yet because
of plastic flavored food perhaps

Then fill a plastic bag with trash
Then add it to the larger stash
To fill the fill at Lac LaHache
where caterpillars mash the hash
until the last financial crash
the super squash the final flash.

michael Hawkes

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/plastic-rapt/