day NINE HUNDRED and SIXTY SIX

it wasn’t loaded

it’s not that $4.65 an hour

was a lot of money

it’s that $5.50 was more

add in benefits, even more

those were the choices then

they haven’t changed much

although with this disparity

they’ve become far more dire

I was failing out of community college

storms of depressions already manifest

I started working two jobs

finals week, I had already surrendered

I started in lawn and garden

days dehydrated in summer sun

green shirts sweat soaked

as we loaded bags of fertilizer

grass seed, plant food

into lines of cars

the suburban lawns would be healthy

this year, even if what was inside

those houses would come to rot

after peak season

I should have been laid off

like the other help

but I was better

I was so good at loading

bags of shit that I would be permanent

wal-mart brought me inside

air conditioning and halogen lights

a house cat now relegated

to sporting goods

never mind I knew nothing  

much worth knowing about sport

I hadn’t been fishing in years

I’d only been hunting once

I was six, my uncle and father

sent me after a rabbit with a twenty-two

rifle, I confirmed my kill

when they tried me teach me to clean it

I nicked the lower intestines

rabbit shit spilled everywhere

I learned quickly

to memorize people’s hunting

and fishing stories, it may be

artificial, that’s what salesmen do

a little encouragement, a little message

something passing quietly

to remind the customer

that what they need

is something they actually want

all the same, I was never comfortable

around the guns, we sold rifles

we sold shotguns. I was amazed

how little awareness people

have with a weapon in their hand

I mean not that I had any training

but I understood clearly never

 point a weapon at a human

even if it wasn’t loaded

I may have known it

it didn’t matter

I don’t know how often

I was distracted

by the attention

that a modern retail environment demands

only to turn my head back to a customer

find myself looking down

the barrel of a gun

when I yelled at the customer

I was told I was an asshole

it wasn’t a big deal

it wasn’t loaded

--Jason Baldinger