A slight cop-out.

Well I've clearly not been writing Friday Poems lately due to a recent severe lack of the ability to use words in a pleasing manner, but here's one I wrote in the spring of 2008, and just now reworked a little bit. Still applies. (Sigh.)


Desperate Measures

You can make a compass with a needle,
with some electricity, with a fork,
with a magnet.
I’ve even heard of a compass
made of a banana and some string.
A piece of fruit can find True North,
in a pinch.
If I were lost, and in need of assistance,
I could consult a snack food.
I am lost, and I’m too upset to eat anyway,
so here I stand
alone on the plane, banana in hand
and half-eaten sandwich on the ground,
pinning down its paper.
Standing here, completely unlaced,
I am squinting into the sun and waiting
for the wind to die down long enough
for me to ask a shoestring
and half my lunch
for directions.