After the New Year
The crystal earths descent
Over heads at Times Square
And Sydney.

The shards crunch
Under high-heel shoes.
The Joneses crash their car
Into the crocodile pond.

The police insist
It was an accident,
But the neighbor
Has his doubts.

Mr. Jones never returned
My soldering iron
Which means he is capable
Of anything.

And he never did build
That birdhouse . . .

Brian Le Lay‘s first full-length book of poems, Don’t Bury Me in New Jersey, is available from Electric Windmill Books. His second book, Smile for the Customers, is forthcoming from Brass Seahorse Books. Recent poems have appeared in Hobo Pancakes, The Rusty Nail, and Gutter Eloquence. He blogs athttp://www.conceiveyourself.blogspot.com