Armadillo Home
Rush Hour, Chicago
Early evening traffic’s
rather heavy.
Autos armadillo home
along the Outer Drive
as out of mouths of buildings
people enter mouths
of anything that moves
wherever every evening
they are going. Tonight
they interrupt the passion
of another person’s day,
the crone astride the hydrant
who once again this evening
bows and swoops and curses
as she burlaps broken glass
gives the finger to nice people
propped in autos staring
as she lets the traffic pass.
Donal Mahoney
