Sonnet CLXVII

Across my bus stop, twenty steps away
there sat a store that seemed a restaurant,
which formed a happy, homely, rustic haunt
where passing motorists would spend the day.

However, doomed to die with lack of pay –
reward for starting in a small-town lawn –
it closed one day, its assets quickly pawned,
and then repainted blue to brownish-grey.

A month or two before the winter came
a brand new business sprang to life with ease,
a shining beacon, sullen grey and new.

But now I see ambition, growing fame,
a sign, a menu, posters on the trees -
and all for money, rude and quick and crude.