Frankenberry's Attic

From Thursday a prompt from Laura Bloomsbury for an ubi sunt  poem (where are they) a term taken from the longer Latin phrase, Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt (where are those who were before us)?

It asks:

• title your poem with the question – where are the/they…
• use the questioning within your poem, even with repetition
• DO NOT ANSWER it though – the questioning is rhetorical

So this then …

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Where Is Our Hat?

Where is that hat

the one that cherry topped preparations

for another night of revelrous revelations and demonstrations of youth

reanimating another’s time from a naive mood

unintended disrespect of a memory I never met

left, found, bagged bundled in a box

in a church parking lot

with long coats and proud button striped shirts 

and slacks that hung just right

above two toned shoes and finger snapping cool  

and watches spun from a hip

like street corner’s zoot cliché school

once

a hat

.

Where is that Fedora worn

for fun

with no sight to the slight

of history of a man

reduced to a bag bundled in a box in a church parking lot

but one that fit just right

soon

then

on me

.

Where is that hat I pine

bought for a dime but only a penny for thoughts

now

please

I hope

In these expensive times

to wish to recall

in my own time

of a man and a hat

gathering things, soon, in a bag bundled for box in a church parking lot

to be found

.

Where is our hat?