Particle Comparison

Decaying Pontiacs and Toyotas
parked diagonally out of apathy.
Dead grass and stray plastic bags
no one wants to chase after.
The time that passes is not sand
in a segmented jar, it is arbitrary
particle comparison.
Getting paid to be afraid
I look at the sky as I walk
into another institution,
another place where people
are second to the ideas
of those they’ve never met.
The will of those who do not look
when they pass through our streets.
The thunder is the screaming we hold back,
and the lightning starts the fires we cannot.
The wind picks up and carries off
the heavy stagnant garbage into a swarm.
The banners on the city lights,
once a mandatory sight,
now shredded into threads,
irreparably torn.