Wednesday Mornings

On Wednesday mornings,

old women with bandanas tied around their white hair

and black, Simalian men

walk the streets on Munjoy Hill.

Poking their heads into blue recycling bins,

they pull out glass bottles and tin cans,

collecting them to take to Hanneford's grocery store

later that day.

Enough change, perhaps, to buy a loaf of bread

or a cup of soup.

Or maybe more--

Maybe, before the sun rises, 

while I slumber in my warm bed of down,

one of them comes in his puffy jacket.

And he collects the bottles--

every single one,

and  makes his fortune.

He will save the money under his pillow 

until there is enough to escape.

To buy a plane ticket out of this icy "Vacationland."

And that is why,

every Wednesday morning,

I hear their empty carts roll from house to house,

and from bin to bin,

criss crossing on the broken cement street.

But I never hear the sound of a bottle drop.