Day 7: Dobject's Thrift Shop

Greasy gold slim-rimmed glasses.
A ripped pair of grey speckled running shoes.
A white toaster coated in a tacky yellow tinge.

"You know where these clothes come from?"
my grandfather asked me
with boggled eyes, frizzled brows,
the mysterious air
of a magician.
The Goodwill lights were dim,
and his 2001 U.S. Open cap
cast a dark line across his bumpy nose.

Molting sequinned couch cushions.
An entire wall hung with threadbare flowerprint bathrobes.
A single fork with an imitation tortoise-shell plastic.
Crumpled and withering paperbacks by Steven King and Tom Clancy.

I stretched a grey blazer in front of me
with an appraising look.
I almost read him the label in the neck.
"Honduras."
But I stopped: it's the obvious answer,
and he looked to serious to ask,
"What brand?"
He must mean, "From who's house?"

A nice leather jacket from "Special Finds", and it almost fits; $20--
A new looking blender that wasn't on the shelf last week.
The wire bin filled with bras is spilling into the main isle.

"Where's that?" I asked.
A charity group, maybe?
Someone he met in the line
of the DMV who told him the real story
of thrift store donations?
It needs just that kind of conspiracy
to explain why it seems so
inexhaustible.
But he hesitated, and only stared before almost whispering.
"Dead people's dressers."