I volunteered for the task
of breaking down the shade umbrella that’d been
occupying space on the gray cement in the yard.

We found it broken at an estate sale.
It came with the table,
was fixed and put to use in faded green splendor,
blew down in a windstorm,
lifted from its housing & smashed into the ground;
was laid in a corner
where it would remain for months.

I had looked down and seen the screws,
postulated that with just the right procedure
I could take it apart cleanly,
break it down into components without smashing it to bits,
and that this would be the better job—
preserve some kind of dignity as it sat
waiting to go to the landfill,
noble trash.

It was easy starting in.
Hand screws held concentric rings supporting slats
that would have framed the sail.
Press-fit plastic moldings sat around the central shaft to stop
it all from sliding out.
And the crown jewel,
the rotating crank system that raised and lowered the whole thing,
geared teeth and leveraged handle working around axles,
took less skill to take apart than to understand.

As it unraveled, piece by piece, I threw it all away.
Popped each one into the air to land inside
the stinking heated trashbin full of cat litter,
clatter and clank.

The hollow poles riveted together,
the bones which wouldn’t fit,
pulled apart quickly around the fastenings,
bent and warped and snapped quite easily.
I stepped into the sun to twist and break them with my foot,
and it was done.

I’d like to think that maybe people work the same;
that we are intricate systems,
built sometimes out of disparate and shoddy components,
who function elegantly until a small piece breaks;
a pulley, a lever.

I’d like to think that as we each approach our individual demise
we can retain some dignity,
on our way to dissolve again into an organic soup
or rusty assemblage of discarded parts;
to think that
with a careful procedure, and with just the right amount of torque,
I could make you come to pieces in my loving hands.