A.A. Gunther

Song of the Mall Rats

We’re drinking drinking Jamba Juice

Out of a plastic cup,         

Wouldn’t it be great if this could

           All

           Blow

           Up?

We’re standing by the Spencer’s we admire the supply,

Can you just imagine if it

           Blew

           Sky-

           High?

That straw you use is killing all the turtles every day,

But shit, your teeth are sensitive, I guess that it’s okay.

And on the escalators we pretended and pretended:

Wouldn’t you just love to see the whole damn thing upended?

We’d sleep in the IKEA and we’d meet inside the Sears,

We’d eat the deer that wandered in, for years and years and years.

We looked at movie posters and we tilled the seed we’d planted,

We stood above the food court and we wove our bleak enchantment.

And way out in the parking lot, our voices did resound:

Wouldn’t you feel FREE if it could

           All

           Fall

           Down?

***

We’re lying wide-eyed in the dark and texting from in bed.

Wouldn’t it be shitty if it

           All

           Stayed

           Dead?

A. A. Gunther is a legal writer from Long Island, New York. Her short fiction can be found in Dappled Things, while her poetry appears in The Friday Poem, Mezzo Cammin, ONE ART, Ekstasis, and elsewhere. She has eight younger siblings, at least two of whom can vouch for her character.