genesisFall2016.pdf


6  genesis fall 2016

Amidst the melody of beeping registers 
and the harmony of whirring carts, 
I stand at a table of graphic tees 
in the men’s department, folding a shirt depicting
a cat on the moon, dressed as an astronaut, 

stop to look at Ball State hoodies. 
The boy, bored with clothes not meant 
for him, zips between the racks, 
unaware of smears of bird droppings 
left on the metal frames like notes on sheet music, 

to the song of supply and demand. 
After a while, the boy tires of his part 
in the store’s rhythm section and throws in his own refrain.
I wanna look at toys.
When his parents answer with the resolving 
notes in their chord of no,
his piano pleas crescendo 
into forte wails; a countermelody 
taken up by the bird in the rafters. 
Only when the parents drag the boy away 
does his chorus of demands decrescendo 
into silence, but the bird remains, 
belting out his dream of free air, 
unheard by anyone except me.

The Song of a Sparrow Trapped in a Supermarket
Rachel Smith