I was taking my dirty bomb
to the laundro-mat today.

By the time I got there
it was gone,
invisible to the naked eyes
aiming down on desert sands
sprinkled with armor-piercing bomb dust.

There I was,
waiting in the queue
behind the cash converters
at the laundro-mat,
and

I was searching my pockets
for some change
-realising there needed to be one-
and
I noticed the hole
that dirty bomb fell through,
between the Cesium filled X-ray machines,
and
the Uranium-chambered food freshening devices,
and
I noticed my hands were kind of glowing
in the falling dusk
close to midnight.

But where had that damn dirty bomb got to?
Had it accidentally exploded on the pavement
beside the skips and bins 
filling up with all this radiant technology?
Had it been carted off by some
spiritually cleansed, god-worshipping hooligans
of such little faith  
that they took the law into their prayer-worn hands
and thread it through
my darned, unclean 
pocket holes?

Or was it everywhere, 
weighing me down, 
filling my pockets
from the holes on up,

a dirty 24/7 
time-bomb of the imagination,
waiting to go off
beside me
in the lengthening queue.

10/6/02