At the Market

Shopping with my mother

I'm fifty going on nine

in the produce section

the green disarray of lettuces

flamboyant peppers

add some flair

as if Matisse had been let loose there.

Above our heads

the industrial rafters

are chirping with excitement

two skittering little birds

jumping gaily

humming their good fortune.

Nothing green can stay

as nothing alive can either

up there flying over berries and mangos.

Nervously, I shift on one foot

looking for a man

with murder in his net.

This store here,

now remodeled

I remember in the 1980s

when a woman ran through

the plate glass window in front

with a frozen chicken

already dead, of course,

that bird and its stilled wings.

Perhaps I could entice these two down

with some blood red strawberries

make a run for the exit?

My mother

deep in thought

critiquing the shortcomings of the peaches

doesn't see that blind death is creeping

from the dazzling display

of sunshine oranges

into the bins of

discarded produce.