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