A Delicatessen is an Impasse

A delicatessen is an impasse: unchurched but unspilled;

a small, curvilinear dog on a Midwest plateau
the Thursday before two great cities
shall, in the backhand stroke of a tree branch,
clash upon the red hair of law.

It is an unopened pint of ale laughing at me
on a cold winter afternoon by drained fountains
all roped about with yellow tape.

It is a growling uncle stuck in dry grasses
on an a ship of bibliokleps and camerawomen.

Oh vinegar chips and pop and collared shirts!
—like Bulgarian water
and Vermonter momma’s boys
chilling out on quinquagesiman isotherms—
I have thy impious knots,
secular, adhesive,
collecting in my flask of salami mink.