The plastic violin missing two strings,
the Louisville Slugger with a wooden splinter,
the printer that only takes paper with the holes on the side.
I stroll up and down the aisles at Savers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I scope out the selections:
The shirts, the shoes, the chains holding old lockets
with the lovers’ picture still inside.
On the far wall I see the little bags
bursting with ephemera:
Bubble wrapped shot glasses, silverware of all shapes and sizes,
staples, playing cards, phone cases, chip clips,
PH strips, peanut butter jar lids, light bulbs,
bouncy balls, ballpoint pens, pocket calculators,
crayons, stick-on tattoos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I peruse each and every bag, begging for their stories.
Does each contain a little slice of a life
or a mish-mosh of many?
Were the tangle of hair ties all meant for the same head?
Were they ever used?
And if they were: Why?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It must be the dust or the mold
in this old warehouse making my mind wander,
but I like to believe that each of the bags
has a purpose.
The ballpoint pen, for example,
was bought by a man in Billerica
who wrote letters to his daughter in Saugus,
hands shaking as he scrawled each word,
holding tight to the old ways in the digital age
until he died.
When his daughter went to clean his old house,
she found the pen, and not knowing what it meant,
she brushed it into a box and brought it down
to the loading dock,
where it rose from the darkness
trapped in plastic, watching people pass by
brimming with memories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I pluck out the pen and place it in my pocket.
You call it stealing, I call it saving.
Besides, you can’t put a price tag
on something so priceless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I drew the Fool before I found my way to Savers.
I found a new beginning in a ballpoint pen
which made many memories for another man,
as did the plates that once held Passover meals,
the monogrammed messenger bags and briefcases,
the clubs kept polished up until their last time around the back nine,
as well as the albums and notebooks, mostly blank,
but with one scrap of a sentence or a smile
to show they once belonged
to anyone at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n