by: Sheryl Luna
Lowering Your Standards for Food Stamps
Words fall out of my coat pocket,
soak in bleach water. I touch everyone’s
dirty dollars. Maslow’s got everything on me.
Fourteen hours on my feet. No breaks.
No smokes or lunch. Blank-eyed movements:
trash bags, coffee burner, fingers numb.
I am hourly protestations and false smiles.
The clock clicks its slow slowing.
Faces blur in a stream of hurried soccer games,
sunlight, and church certainty. I have no
poem to carry, no material illusions.
Cola spilled on hands, so sticky fingered,
I’m far from poems. I’d write of politicians,
refineries, and a border’s barbed wire,
but I am unlearning America’s languages
with a mop. In a summer-hot red
polyester top, I sell lotto tickets. Cars wait for gas
billowing black. Killing time has new meaning.
A jackhammer breaks apart a life. The slow globe
spirals, and at night black space has me dizzy.
Visionaries off their meds and wacked out
meth heads sing to me. A panicky fear of robbery
and humiliation drips with my sweat.
Words some say are weeping twilight and sunrise.
I am drawn to dramas, the couple arguing, the man
headbutting his wife in the parking lot.
911: no metered aubade, and nobody but
myself to blame.
This poem originally appeared in the 2014 April issue of Poetry Magazine.
Analysis:
Contrary to the title of the piece, the poem is not about "lowering your standards," but not being able to raise your standards due to your current situation. The speaker knows her struggle and witnesses/helps those everyday who do not have her same struggles, or realize her struggles. Alliteration is found throughout the poem that emphasizes the emotions of the speaker. ex) dirty dollars.
The speaker is also envious of those who live an "easy" life. This is shown through her use of language as she observes the seemingly normal people around her, "I sell lotto tickets. Cars wait for gas." She knows that their lives have substance while hers is wasted working "fourteen hours on my feet."
The speaker also says "I am unlearning America's languages with a mop." This symbolizes that she possibly had the "american dream" in mind and she sees herself losing that opportunity with everyday that she spends working at the gas station.
Lastly, the speaker says "I'm far from poems," which shows that she is not in a place that she wants to be.
