lost

There is something sapping at the seems,
blinking blindly behind the scenes, groping for the greens,
fistfuls of dollars and lint, all smoked up after unknowable dreams,
platitudinous looks of longing, out into confused futures,
out over acres and acres and acres of nothingy farm land,
where they see themselves wrongly standing
and wringing the necks of chickens for hope, and for dignity,
with ironically soft hands,
 from no work,
and some of them with hard hands
 from work sites
and meeting over the table of hopelessness,
stabbing the gaps between their fingers,
 dignity smoking itself under the table,
trying to forget something,
forgetting it,
wracking brains to remember.