Intermission

Every year in the dying summer
a spring tide of human flotsam
floods the harvest town.

Necessity vs intolerance
gusts of ill ease ruffle provincialism.
Razor tongued judgement = tongue bitten resignation.

Dropouts
and opt outs
dreamers, and the disillusioned
merge to eclectic diaspora.

Needed and unwanted
they crawl over the area,
like a goldminer staking a claim.

They know the best places,
whose wife bakes muffins
and who
and where to avoid.

There are no complications
nothing is unknown
during daylight – work….
… after sunfall
once dark enfolds
and labour has showered and eaten – ask no questions.

Then,
as autumn empties to winter,
when everything is gathered,
tolerance separates from necessity –
until next year.