Orders Up



It’s a marvelous season for a trading session; lasts all through winter, the purest ticking from your old creaky watch. 

No one’s giddy enough to take the mic and start a hymn; no one’s brave enough to raise their hand and ask for another drink.

The sorrow in the air almost make you laugh inside. How can the taste of despair have the nerves to calm your pounding heart, when it’s the reason that started the chaos within?

The trade begins. All around you, objects on display that were once priced possessions, now shuddering and begging to be thrown away. 

There’s no remorse here, just a trade that needs to happen for things to be bought and sold, for hearts to be broken and mend.

You don’t understand how a trade can go on in dead silence. You hear the shouting and shrieking next door, and the one two stores down. 

What a show, what a commotion. You wonder why hadn’t your business have that much drama and hype.

Something in you remembered a time when your trades are the best in town. 

Parties that chimed through the rainforests like a call of spring, nights that stretched through the face of a Cheshire cat from end to end. 

You grin at your imagination, surprised at how cunning you are to steal the life of a party pixie in your head.

Is it too late to sing a rock score? Is it too late to pour another more?

Let’s sing a rock score. 

Let’s fight for a toast, wishing away the best of the world to fall into everyone’s home. 

There’s always more to give at this trade, in fact, there’s too much to give. 

And yet, your shelves are swept clean and complaint sheets are scattered like colored confetti on your floors.

The lights are off. 

And your order is up.