The Philadelphia Story

Originally posted on 12/8/2011.

Overheard words
on a Germantown street

a toothless woman
a rusty gun 

have kept me quivering
for two full days

perhaps because
I fear that I myself am growing

toothless 
and rusty

Whatever put them there
the words have clutched my ear 

I want them to leave
They are having a hell of time doing it

I don’t know where they should go
I can’t send them home

So struck was I by how they captured me
I never even looked up

to see who in Philadelphia
was using them

Never even looked up
to see who truly owned them