Thursday, October 19, 2017

Coming Out


When I put a quarter in the table-top jukebox
for three songs by John Denver, Darrell calls me
a wuss and dares me to try a bite of the breakfast
special, calf brains and eggs. I tell him that, unlike
some people I know, I don’t need to order brains
from a diner—which I can get away with
because he long ago tired of pounding on me,
and anyway I’m paying for the food, and the cigarettes
from the machine, and for wherever we might
decide to go where there might be girls to see us
smoke. Last week when I told him I thought
I wanted to be a poet, he looked at me the way
my father did when I told him I was leaning
Democrat, or like my mother when I came out
atheist—just keep praying to lord Jesus, dear
I could see my words zipping through Darrel’s
head like a hummingbird had come in through a tear
in the screen door and really wanted out now,
but in the end  it was enough for him to blow smoke
in my face, make me swear to god I still liked girls.

First published in Pembroke Magazine