Hawk Shop: Buy Sell Pawn

every door an open door to bloody
palms, silver fee; the lot next between
is over grown, dirty forgotten flowers
claw out pavement cracks and roots
that swallow whole all dark earth-

three bikes out front but no one knows
who they’re for; kids in the backseat of cars
pulled up to the curb, hands against the
smeared window glass- they know
better than to speak

important business is going on
inside.

and it is always shadowed in precarious
piles, the gods of debt cracking split-lip
smiles from their backroom perches and
the blood they’ll earn- they’ve been
around for a long time now and
they drink the desperation in turn-

no one knows the owner, he doesn’t
live in town; the girl behind the counter
might once have been the teacher’s pet the
ribbon-threaded library queen but she’s
seen too much of what wakes in the dark
to ever work anywhere else-

all the encased promises,
rings and lockets, TVs, guns-
held-up point blank for another
oath, a few more days untinged
by blood a pool of wan yellow light
an offhand nod to the kids outside
and nothing’s ever worth what it’s
worth when it’s handed over
spilling pride and broken knuckles,
bruised-up jaws- they know the ghosts lurk
right inside but wonders always cease
to matter when you need to know
you can eat tonight.

By Lindsay Maruska

Biography:

Lindsay Maruska is a thirty-year-old forever student who is pursuing a second MA degree while raising one child and five dogs. She is interested in modern mythology and the intersection of regional gothic and social commentary on industrial ruin.