Andrew Burke’s ‘Shop Locally’

from ‘The Line is Busy’

‘Keith the Butcher is better suited
to conduct my funeral than
Father Fahey,’ Frank said in
the shopping centre café, coffee tasting
like burnt tar, muffin crumbling
on his off-white face.
Mock-stained-glass windows framed
consumers relieving aching backs
and knotted veins. ‘None of that God stuff
when they send me off, mate.
Dead’s dead.’ I forewent
a second cup, mentally ticked
off my list, threaded fingers through
handles of Coles supermarket bags,
and stood to go. ‘See ya, mate.’
‘Not if I see you first.’

In the car park, shopping propped
against the back bumper, I clicked
‘unlock’, threw open the boot,
and paused, considering the metaphors
of everyday, cryptic tropes of our living tongue
wriggling in the minds of
late capitalist man. ‘Hot enough for you?’
asked the woman with
The Goddess Dances on her rear window.