Green Trash Can

a poem and a reflection

November 8th, one or two birch leaves
spin and flutter onto concrete,
falling from evergreen canopies.
I run trying to catch glimmers
of those leaves, less green, before they meet the ground,
and the sun smiles in straight lines
warming concrete where
pushups, burpees, squats, and planks
send blood careening through my arms and legs.
The green trash can rustles 
like trees in the Rockies in January.
I stare but my head, where it attaches to my spine,
aches and the green trash can becomes a green trash can;
containing bags of dog shit and Burger King and
needles and broken frisbees.
Like Stonehenge
it neither asks my name, or offers its own.
Running back this trash can baffles me
clouding my vision with neon mist so that
I almost missed it before me
—the spider, spinning, smuggling itself up its thread
and out of my way.

---

---

Reflection:

I wrote this poem after a run. As I’m sure you can tell, the green trash can at the park I run at caught my attention. From there my imagination took over.

As poets, our imagination is one of our greatest tools. The ability to look at the world and to see through it and in it leads to beautiful images, immaculate rhymes, and cunning insights. However, the imagination can sometimes become a runaway train. It needs guardrails as much as anything; we must train it to do its job.

This poem takes the trash can—a disgusting vessel filled with disgusting things—and shows an imagination run amuck. The obsession with the trash can ends up leading myself to almost miss true beauty and sublimity: the spider. A creature building a delicate and ordered web with the one goal of capturing prey. This spider cuts above the green trash can. It’s worthy of a poem and the imaginations awe. This poem is set up to be a warning to mis-ordered imaginations.

I hope you enjoy the poem!

---

---