IRON PENNIES
by Michael Brockley
(Inspired by “Possibilities” by Wislawa Szymborska)
I choose Mexican wedding cakes, crunchy peanut butter and persimmon pudding. I choose
Chevrolets on Kansas highways on November nights. I choose cheerleaders on teams with no
trophies. Brunettes in black dresses. The virgin saints. I choose German shepherds, oracles that
howl at thunder. I choose the Ghost Who Walks over Superman. Marvel over D.C. I choose
unrequited love. And those Grimm’s fairy tales refulgent with bitter queens. I choose deafness. I
choose the buzz of wasps plotting new revolts in their January nests. I choose Calvin and
Hobbes. And the enemy who is us. On the day the ACME anvil falls, I choose Wile E. Coyote. I
choose a stranger's Pandora's box. After last call, I choose saxophone solos and westbound trains.
I choose the day after in Triggering Town and the leap between needing and wanting. I choose
the stiff arm. I choose the spin move. Soundtracks of songs with “run” in their titles. Silver
Certificates and iron pennies. And dictionaries written to rescue extinct words. I choose Rosalita.
I choose Ruthie in her honky-tonk lagoon. I choose van Gogh. No, I choose Miró and Breakfast
of Champions. I choose the god who chose not t