Blue Balloon

by James Jarvis
10/07/01
Blue Balloon,
hovering two feet over a brownish, overgrown vacant lot,
like an off-color scarecrow,
like an airhead sentinel
guarding weeds.
From where have you come, blue balloon?
Did you escape the small, stubby fingers of a child,
breaking her young heart?
Did you tear loose from a grand opening,
floating away from your brothers and sisters unnoticed?
Were you carelessly anchored or did you struggle?
Or maybe you're a terrorist weapon,
anthrax spores mixed with your helium.
I saw you last night, blue balloon
bobbing and poking your plastic head a foot above the weeds.
Did you have a message for me?
For someone like me?
This morning I came out to visit you
and you were dead . . .or sleeping . . .
lying in the dirt amid the weeds
shrunken half last night's size,
immobile.
I never knew you, blue balloon.
I know you flew.
I know you soared to great heights
before you landed in the abandoned lot
where all manner of abandoned others landed;
broken stuff, unwanted stuff, unuseablle stuff:
worn tires and broken pots and candy bar wrappers . . .
but you flew there, blue balloon.
I'll give you that.