Chicken Wire

Three rolls of chicken wire,
left there in the road as though someone
is laying traps, undisturbed and you will hardly
find me the first to folly;
a man need not be wise, so much as incrementally clever,
removing batteries from the fire alarm until there is a fire,
the last man over the top like hyperbole repellant mosquitos
on the thirsty blood-hunt....
Getting out of bed this morning, I threw my back out
and it wasn't even garbage day,
the pendulum-middle of the week, "hump day"
I have heard it called, that surly hairnet cashier with the questionable scars
making change like a tiny exact utopia—
each man is a failed custodian of Self
long before he finds the sorry sullied mess of the world,
but no one will touch those three rolls of chicken wire,
not even the local boys that can't stop touching themselves
in public every five minutes which seems to arouse quite a clamour
amongst those most ugly of propertied ducklings
while I try to snore, to sleep.