The Sugar Thief

If it was free, you taught, I ought to grab it as you did: McDonald’s napkins, pens, and from the school where you were once employed as one of two night shift custodians, the metal imitation wood wastebasket still under my desk. But it was sugar that you took most often as, annoyed on leaving Dunkin’ Donuts, pancake house, and countless diners, I felt implicated in your pleasure, crime, and poverty. I have them still, your Ziploc bags of plunder, yet I find today, among the loose change in my pockets, packets crushed or faded— more proof of your lasting legacy.