📃 Daily(ish) poem → 00355 ◊ Busking ◊ …

Busking

The day folds up like money
if you’re lucky. Mostly

sun cold coin
drumming into the blue

of a guitar case. Close
up & head home.

Half-hundred times wanted
to hock these six strings

hack, if I could, my axe
into firewood. That blaze

never lasts.
I’ve begged myself hoarse

sung streetcorner
& subway over train’s blast

through stale air & trash.
You’ve seen me, brushed past—

my strings screech
& light up like third rail—

Mornings, I am fed by flies,
strangers, sunrise.