The Pink Slip Poem by RIC BASTASA

At the bottom of the files it was kept there
April 2,2002
Remember the exact date
A pink slip
Among the yellow sheets
Inside the big brown envelope

Life does not complete the cycle
Without it
You want to forget it
You bury it
On layers and layers of sadness
Like sand and gravel and leaves and grass and rocks

It never dies
It shouts the truth that there was this coward
Inside you
Crying for justice
Looking for a redemption

Today you take that pink slip again
Touching the edges and
Rereading the story that it is telling
The words there are painful

It is only you who knows what it means
It is both freedom and vengeance breathing
Life again saying

Tomorrow, yes tomorrow that star
Out there shall soon fall
And your laughter shall be last
Reverberating
Beyond the four corners of
The pink slip