Cash Box
You bring single bills
for the sealed box
and pull off the road
by the sawhorse sign.
In another month the stand
will be a hollow husk
but today the wooden planks
are bowed with
boxes of produce.
Corn is fresh-picked
and pre-sorted,
twelve ears to a bag.
Eggplants bubble beside
the powdery cheeks of peaches.
You inspect the Big Boys,
smell the laces of dill.
There is no charge for lingering
here in the ripe solitude
of the summer honor system,
no charge for watching
the coin of the sun
deposit its gold
in the hayfield.
You slide your bills
through the slot of the box
and they drift down
in the stillness
like fall leaves.
Six dollars.
It doesn’t seem like enough
For all you carry away.