The Office at Four in the Afternoon
by Kathryn Lester-Bacon


Time, stacked, apportioned,
rears up angrily and will not be
pushed through the motions
one more time.
It stands, breathes, holds itself upright
as if on two legs, sinews rippling,
and we all stop, admit we aren’t
actually working on the Imminent
and Dire, and instead look
up from screen, out window,
see the ragged red leaf peel
from the green sheaf of limbs
next to the brown plastic bag
caught on a branch inside out
where the gash of a label
shouts its orange name,
loudly, calmly, backwards.






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