In the ongoing search for the lost works of Bean Newton, we occasionally run across Newton's attempts to, as he put it in letters and conversations to friends, "go straight." Newton's "normal" was often anarchic, experimental, associative. The "straight" poems speak not just of Newton's efforts to move toward more mainstream poetry, but also of Newton's life, which consisted of low-level retail work, the occasional miserable stint at a call center, and long hours at a janitorial service.
Here, Newton explores the retail portions of his life. The poem was found by the former editor of a long defunct literary journal, the journal an early victim of state university budget cuts.
The manuscript had fallen behind the editor's desk and shook out when the editor yanked on an errant length of CAT-5. -- E.W. Wilder
Cruel Grooves
"The crank and the wheel,
the Oort of the deal,
the rise of the means,
and the lack of dem beans."
--Anon.
I
Comfit fort jeans sway
and swag on the rack, fabric
smell and fact'ry bloom
into our big box. We're not
exactly cozy; we're cold
in our red & tan. Beth barks
a coff and her freckles
turn blue. A minute, a
minuet, another breeze
off the parking lot. New
tar and the tang
of stall-line paint.
A rabbit in the ease-
ment eyes me—I know
it but can't see it, pink
petals off the redbud;
the HVAC begins
its long breath again.
II
"Teamwork," says Larry, and
some other words. Loyalty
is lost on us; we're thinking
forward to the next pizza,
the next bit or byte of play.
I sort and hang, pull
pallets, unpack. Soon,
I s'pose, I'll be auto-
mated—the glory
to be a part of the grand
cycle of innovation (!)
Or the enervation
of ten bucks an hour.
An owl disposes
of time. Next yard
over from the rickety
deck, a refusal. Eggs
impound the factory.
At the rectory,
ancient lives project
into space. I hope
God or the Pod
People are listening.
Grapes explode in the Dumpster.
III
Croesus has come to us, a cliché;
Oprah warns of "affluenza."
Easy for her to say.
IV
There may be rhyme—there is
no reason, only coffeegrounds,
banana peels, roadkill, and
crumbling concrete. Paint
flakes, fades, cracks. Car
alarms peal and whine, honk
out the acceptable paranoia
of privilege. Fuck you, man.
Nobody wants your damn
Tahoe.
V
But everybody wants. That's why
we're here, why we scan, why
you slide, why carts and carts
wheel out, yesterday's ore
and oil, all tomorrow's
garbage. You don't want to
own; you want to buy
and die, to have left
a legacy on someone
else's ledger.