found beneath leaves on a bridge
during a sun shower after a parade.
Under wet leaves,
the body straps lay shriveled and abandoned,
remnants of last week's parade and its dying fervor.
The leaves cradled the adorned leather,
shielding them from the rain.
I pulled the leaves from the straps
and used my shirt to wipe them clean.
I imagined the straps rehearsing this moment.
Perhaps they spoke, "Let's give them a show... Touch me,"
when I lifted them into the sun.
They glimmered and dripped with light and rain,
plump, coming alive like the bodies that had once animated them.