James Benger
Steeped
They don’t know why they’re here;
not just the broken-down trailer
squatting at the edge of the weeds,
but why they’ve kept going
for so, so long when nothing pans out.
Though, they do like that expression:
panning out, maybe because as
what little family legend resides in them,
that’s what their forebears did,
fat lot of good it did them.
Their entire line as far back as
time as described by blurry photographs
and nth-generation anecdotes goes
is an endless parade of near destitution.
They first chose this place
not out of necessity, but out of a true
willingness, desire, even, to fade,
to fall off a cliff without actually going.
At least that’s what they tell themselves
as the kettle whines again in the kitchenette,
scalding water that is far from filtered
destined for a cup and teabag,
the cup crusted with lack of cleaning
(what’s the point if you’re just going to
put more of the same in there again?),
and the bag on its third, but probably
not last go, as they try to syphon
every last everything, just as the world
has unapologetically done to them.
Other work by James Benger