Ode to the Bag of Ice at the Gas Station

Praise the chest freezer humming by the door“with its one word, ICE, and its whole life's work:“to keep a thing exactly what it was.“

Praise the bag of it — eight pounds, three dollars,“sweating already in my hand, and the sound of it,“which is the sound of a small cheap avalanche.“

Praise that nobody has ever once been sad“about a bag of ice. It is not for keeping.“It is for the cooler, the cousin, the folding chair,“the long green evening of somebody's whole July.“

Praise a thing that is good only while it is going.“Praise the going. Praise the cousin. Praise July.“