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Meg Pokrass
Bad Ideas
Sipping dry Rhubarb soda on the roof, I wish it were whisky. It's my
birthday. The screen door's open. Mom and Lucky, her toy poodle,
below, watch reality television. I can smell them even up there, her
sweat swollen and primitive.
Waiting for the moon to rise and light the way down, I mainly hear
the highway's moan, the farts of trucks ruining our tiny flap of
ozone. The yard shuffles with fireflies. Frank Sinatra would write a
song about my life tonight because it feels big, Las Vegas-y. He
would call it, "Spanish Moon." The highway would be a good place if
you were Frank Sinatra, even vacant motels would glow.
My elbows hurt from leaning back. If someone could see me they might
say, "she's just joking, or ribbing someone up there."
Then, someone else perhaps would scream out, "So what. She's going
to get hurt, someone should talk to her!"
A spider crawls over my bare knee and makes a sound I have never
heard. That only a gargoyle can hear. He tells me this: If I were
more feminine, one-handed, or spoke in three octaves, she would
have loved me. She would not say I'm "cop-like." "Plodding."
She would not hug Lucky, her real daughter. A sidesplitting
commercial would still make her laugh. She would say, "okay" to the
TV screen, then drive to the 7-11 -- linger near the rack of dumb
humor cards, Finger them as though they are written in Braille.
looking for the perfect birthday sentiment.
And the moon would not have risen the right way, would not have
gotten so bright.
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