Salvage poem – Amy Clampitt poems | Poems and Poetry

Daily the cortege of crumpled

defunct cars

goes by by the lasagna-

layered flatbed

truckload: hardtop

reverting to tar smudge,

wax shine antiqued to crusted

winepress smear,

windshield battered to

intact ice-tint, a rarity

fresh from the Pleistocene.

I like it; privately

I find esthetic

satisfaction in these

ceremonial removals

from the category of

received ideas

to regions where pigeons’

svelte smoke-velvet

limousines, taxiing

in whirligigs, reclaim

a parking lot,

and the bag-laden

hermit woman, disencumbered

of a greater incubus,

the crush of unexamined

attitudes, stoutly

follows her routine,

mining the mountainsides

of our daily refuse

for artifacts: subversive

re-establishing

with each arcane

trash-basket dig

the pleasures of the ruined.