dummy

At the state fair he popped the trunk and they came out
all rushed and hoping, just like the tin soldiers
that we released in the park–gung ho for the water,
the jungle/forest of make-believe. I thought that the ducks
were going to go mad from honking. Helicopters,
cranky-cranks–you might have imagined that they hadn’t even
seen soldiers before.
                                                 But the knives were forever rusting,
and we were forever sharpening them–not so much for glamour
as for something to do, between the time we got to the fair
and when the fair actually opened. All those tickets,
kids needing haircuts, and rides like the Screaming Mimi,
Momo the Monster, and my favorite, the Zipper,
which flung you (almost) into the teeth of steely knives.

And now they have a machine that can do it all–a lathe–
which I always imagine as a saintly sort of a thing. Lathe…
I know it’s not that, but still–lathe…. And they can make
as many kinds as they want just by turning the dials.
Soda fountain, cotton candy machine–you name it. Lathe…
like, how much control can you give me?