Ode to the Curb

Journal Entry: Weight = 173.6; Coinage = $.50, 25 pennies, 1 quarter; Glass bottles = 8; Ground Scores = 5; Best Money Find = a quarter along a curb in historic Mid City New Orleans.

Feature Entry: Ode to the Curb by By the MoneyWalker, aka bleason

Only a perusal, but it seems that n’er a verse has been penned
By those masters of rhyme and pentameter, those would be laureates.
Where are the tributes to that great guardian of the greens—the curb?
Please! Do not mention the lowly gutter.
We have heard quite enough of your dark existential chatter
About those that reside in the repository of dirt, filth, and grime.
Both inanimate and as well as the animated—especially that creature of failed hope—mankind.
Too often we must follow your vortex guided journeys to a vacuum of loneliness, boredom and despair.
Be not confused, a gutter is not a curb!
Where is your optimism, your awe of inspired creations?
Can you not see that hope is a mere nine inches away,
But above.
Like most good, in juxtaposition with evil.
Can we not count the goodness of the curb?
Those dropped coins forever lost into the netherworld
Without the rounded but vertical guard.
Can you not at least perform simple rhymes?
See a penny
Suppress a whinny.
See a nickel
Suppress a tickle.
See a dime
Suppress the time.
And the quarter, captain of coins, how often are you saved from the Permanent purgatory of earthly entombment by those nine inches of enlightenment,The curb?
How so? Because the light incidental sand of the street may cover your countenance for a moment,
But only until the ubiquitous yard man comes with his machine and once again
Exposes your brilliance, for his pockets if vigilant, or for the deeper pockets of the always watchful MoneyWalker.
But that is so petty to mention the great outlier as your defense.
There are so many arguments for your watchful containment.
Take away your presence and what of that ribbon of green
That is forever your godchild—the green grass of summer?
Would not the oils of greenhouse warming not smoother you
Into oblivion?
Nay, there are too many examples of your excellence to embrace cynicism.
The poets are once again blinded to the obvious truth of your selfless performance.
Aren't these simple truths not apparent to them?
Are they not worthy of your Eliot-like artfulness?
Oh curbs, without tenure or worldly acknowledgement,
Finally,
One has stepped out in praise of your brilliance.

MoneyWalker