Huddled out the back door of the thrift store
the death of Capitalism laid bare:
caged without reason behind chain link facing
front and ranked at attention a dozen captive
soldiers with no battle to bear and wearing
identical Grenadier caps of snow.
No one will use them again, disposable
mercenaries heralding planned
obsolescence and the death of the noble.
Or perhaps simply discarded broken home
appliances, nobody's symbol but my own.
Snow piles up in the night and that's no image
out there, asleep under the bridge.
(From Not Me, Exactly, c. 2020 by Dennis Held)