Third Edit: Dollar Store Blues

[Thunderembargo]

First Edit:

Dollar Store Blues

Whenever she crosses that threshold,
she starts to feel like she's sleepwalking.
In the cleaning aisle,
she swears she hears an allegory
about sponges and unwanted messes
until she is distracted by a sale for expired taffy;
so sticky and sweet, yet barely fulfilling a need
she'd rather deny exists.
She closes her eyes, allowing fluorescent lights
to bath her like a cold shower.
Eventually, she arrives at her purpose:
Is she there to buy beans or soup?
She pretends the decision hasn't already been made
like her husband's bed.
Placing a finger against her lip,
she smells the soap she bought here a week ago.
Mechanically, she reaches for a can
and it sticks to her palm like a magnet.
Her hands smell of cheap metal as she approaches to pay.
The cashier smiles androgynously.
The cash register speaks,
the dream ends.


Original:

Dollar Store Blues

Crossing the threshold feels somnambulistic.
In the cleaning aisle,
she swears she sees an allegory
until she is distracted by a sale for expired taffy;
so sticky and sweet, yet barely fulfilling a need
she'd rather deny exists.
She closes her eyes, allowing the fluorescent lights
to bath her like a cold shower.
Eventually, she arrives at her purpose:
Is she there to buy beans or soup?
She pretends the decision hasn't already been made
like he husband's bed.
Placing a finger against her lip,
she smells the soap she bought here a week ago.
Mechanically, she reaches for a can
and it sticks to her palm like a magnet.
Her hands smell of cheap metal as she approaches to pay.
The cashier smiles androgynously.
The cash register speaks,
the dream ends.

Before giving any cogent insight into the 1st edit of this truly fascinating slice of poetic work I do want to mention, and I almost find it necessary to do so, that my friend was just arrested at a dollar store for stealing certain ingredients for the composition of some radical street drug; enough to Break Benjamin, that's for sure.

I really like the mundane and bucolic tone of the poem, its semi-tragic or perhaps tragi-comic, Steppeford Wife kind of rhythm and imagery.   Yet my friends recent experience at the dollar general  (or was it dollar tree, not sure,) shows that Dustin Hoffman in drag, is not the inevitable experience when going to your local dollar store. 

Dollar Store Blues

Whenever she crosses that threshold,
she starts to feel like she's sleepwalking.                  
In the cleaning aisle,
she swears she hears an allegory                             this is a profound claim or at least profoundly anti-climactic, except that usually allegory refers to the incarnation of symbol in living personages
about sponges and unwanted messes
until she is distracted by a sale for expired taffy;       
so sticky and sweet, yet barely fulfilling a need
she'd rather deny exists.
She closes her eyes, allowing fluorescent lights 
to bath her like a cold shower.                          i think that this would reflect more accurately as a warm shower
Eventually, she arrives at her purpose:
Is she there to buy beans or soup?                   this has natural metabolic resolution, but may be too straightforward, ironically, perhaps a bit of detail in adverbial definition would add just the right measure of irony................ "peppery" beans,or, "watery" soup
She pretends the decision hasn't already been made
like her husband's bed.                                    here,in my judgement, you have arrived at the second great allegorical epiphany of the poem, this steppeford wife is being formed to recognize her own powerlessness to make meaningful and/or self-actualized decisions,   this is well written                                 
Placing a finger against her lip,
she smells the soap she bought here a week ago.     a very vivid image that you are flawlessly directing within the poem
Mechanically, she reaches for a can
and it sticks to her palm like a magnet.
Her hands smell of cheap metal as she approaches to pay.
The cashier smiles androgynously.
The cash register speaks, 
the dream ends.                                                   these last four lines pay for themselves, and they also happen to pay for everybody else who does their shopping in this outrageous commercial 

Dollar Store Blues

Whenever she crosses that threshold,
she starts to feel like she's sleepwalking.
In the cleaning aisle,
she swears she hears an allegory
about sponges and unwanted messes
until she is distracted by a sale for expired taffy;
so sticky and sweet, yet barely fulfilling a need
she'd rather deny exists.
She closes her eyes, allowing fluorescent lights 
to bath her like a cold shower.
Eventually, she arrives at her purpose:
Is she there to buy beans or soup?
She pretends the decision hasn't already been made
like her husband's bed.
Placing a finger against her lip,
she smells the soap she bought here a week ago.
Mechanically, she reaches for a can
and it sticks to her palm like a magnet.
Her hands smell of cheap metal as she approaches to pay.
The cashier smiles androgynously.
The cash register speaks, 
the dream ends.