Litter in ditches: water bottles,
Bud Light cans, cigarette packs.
A bag of diapers not used yet.

Litter in trees: junk mail, Kleenex,
the blue skins of balloons—
a barrage of human garbage.

Litter in wetlands, on farmland, where
birds pick and choose their bird meals
from sandwich wrappers blown there. 

A rash of rubbish, the itch of it,
the redness. The spread of it. 

The litter, the clutter, the junk of junkyards:
carcasses of trucks, coffee tables turned up-
side down, chairs with no backs, lamps
without cords, couches minus pillows:
deconstructed living rooms lived in last
night, cardboard shelters abandoned   
when embers of trash-can fires faltered.

Overhead: planets not yet landed on,
their auras bright in tonight’s black sky
under which we stand and draw breath,
our deaths a distant rumor.

*

Wyn Cooper has published five books of poetry, including, most recently, Mars Poetica. His
poems, stories, essays, and reviews have appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Poetry,
as well as in 25 anthologies of contemporary poetry. Many of his poems have been turned into
songs, including by recording artists Sheryl Crow, David Broza, and Madison Smartt Bell. He is
a former editor of Quarterly West, and the recipient of a fellowship from the Ucross Foundation.
For two years he worked at the Harriet Monroe Poetry Institute, a think tank run by the Poetry
Foundation. His first novel, Way Out West, was published in 2022. He lives in Vermont, and
works as a freelance editor. www.wyncooper.com