b a r b a r a  f l e t c h e r: other poems


Spaghetti

A dozen seagulls fight over some spaghetti
spilled on the sidewalk along Bremner Boulevard
The scavengers lunge at the limp noodles,
swallow them like slick worms, leave tomato sauce splattered
on the cement as a memorial to slaugher.

A homeless man on the bench nearby
eyes the birds' feast with salivary envy,
watches the fury of feathers as struggled-for scraps
disappear down each gull's throat. Wishes
that it was night, so that he could scrape up
some spaghetti with his pocket knife under
the anonymity of darkness, without avian eyes
peering at his unwashed hands.
One day, he knows, hunger will win out over pride.
One day he will fight even birds
for the luxury of pasta.