Tonight's Poet Corner: Two Households
Two Households
by Belinda Roddie
Two households -
not alike at all, actually.
One has a married couple
with three young kids.
They mow their front lawn
every morning before
the sun comes up. The father
is balding, so the sweat
runs down his face like his
forehead's a solar-powered
waterfall. Last I checked, he was
still a teller at the bank just down
the street. The mother takes
all three kids to school while
smoking. She smokes three
cigarettes each morning, three
cigarettes each evening. She is
blonde. The kids are blonde. The
kids are white. The kids want a puppy.
The household with the married couple
keeps their television on too loud.
The father and mother argue a lot.
The father drinks copiously after work:
it's always tequila, from the smell
of the recycling bin outside.
He plays poker with his friends
on Sundays. He kisses his friend's wife
on Mondays. The mother pretends that
the wife doesn't exist. She smokes
more, yet she doesn't drink.
Two out of three of the kids
plan to go to college. The other
will drop out and leave a literal steaming
pile of shit on his parents' front porch.
He told me that himself. He is tired
of suburbia. He is tired of fighting.
He is tired of the bullshit.
The household is always dark
on Wednesdays. No music plays
except from the TV. There is no laughter,
and there will never be a puppy. There
will just be dead potted plants. There
will just be cigarette butts growing roots
in the dead potted plants. There will just
be stale hot dogs during the barbecues
they host every Memorial Day and
Labor Day. The swimming pool is
barely used. There will always be
leaves in it. Soggy, gray leaves
leaving fossilized faces in chlorine
and diluted dreams. There is nothing
left that's happy for the kids anymore.
College will be the drug they need
in the vein after all the screaming.
Replacing Father's pint glasses with
Red Solo cups. Replacing Mother's
smokes with vapes and THC.
Replacing paned windows with
gaping black holes.
The other household
is full of the gay.
We are gay.
by Belinda Roddie
Two households -
not alike at all, actually.
One has a married couple
with three young kids.
They mow their front lawn
every morning before
the sun comes up. The father
is balding, so the sweat
runs down his face like his
forehead's a solar-powered
waterfall. Last I checked, he was
still a teller at the bank just down
the street. The mother takes
all three kids to school while
smoking. She smokes three
cigarettes each morning, three
cigarettes each evening. She is
blonde. The kids are blonde. The
kids are white. The kids want a puppy.
The household with the married couple
keeps their television on too loud.
The father and mother argue a lot.
The father drinks copiously after work:
it's always tequila, from the smell
of the recycling bin outside.
He plays poker with his friends
on Sundays. He kisses his friend's wife
on Mondays. The mother pretends that
the wife doesn't exist. She smokes
more, yet she doesn't drink.
Two out of three of the kids
plan to go to college. The other
will drop out and leave a literal steaming
pile of shit on his parents' front porch.
He told me that himself. He is tired
of suburbia. He is tired of fighting.
He is tired of the bullshit.
The household is always dark
on Wednesdays. No music plays
except from the TV. There is no laughter,
and there will never be a puppy. There
will just be dead potted plants. There
will just be cigarette butts growing roots
in the dead potted plants. There will just
be stale hot dogs during the barbecues
they host every Memorial Day and
Labor Day. The swimming pool is
barely used. There will always be
leaves in it. Soggy, gray leaves
leaving fossilized faces in chlorine
and diluted dreams. There is nothing
left that's happy for the kids anymore.
College will be the drug they need
in the vein after all the screaming.
Replacing Father's pint glasses with
Red Solo cups. Replacing Mother's
smokes with vapes and THC.
Replacing paned windows with
gaping black holes.
The other household
is full of the gay.
We are gay.
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