Ode to a Bucket

As a bucket ages, its galvanized surface takes on the look of new ice — that blue- white jigsaw puzzle — or a flock of cranes. Something in its make-up clearly rebels against its type-casting as a mere container or temporary conveyance. Even half-full, for example, the handle cuts into the hand. People rarely think to store a bucket upside-down, so when the bottom rusts through, it can at last retire & start life over: a planter for marigolds on top of a stump in a crew-cut lawn; a transportable target for rifle practice; or hung on a nail in the garden shed, a home for wrens. They line it with grass & weeds & perch burbling on the rim, bobbing up & down on spring-loaded legs, drawing from an inexhaustible well.