| How,
Mother, dressed as you were |
 |
in
that ragged sweater and cotton housedress
poked out in front by your little pot belly,
your graying hair pinned back, your eyes
snapping behind your goldrimmed glasses, |
| and
how, Father, in your blue chambray shirt |
|
and
shapeless trousers, bending half bald
over the plate set before you |
| and
both of you quibbling and I listening |
|
with
the informed contempt of a ten-year old
seeing you could never make peace between you - |
| could
you expect me to believe you had taken my sled |
|
the
night before up the moonlit hill
rutted with snow to bellywhop for hours
until having had enough you came
laughing and rosy into the house ready
to warm yourselves? |
Virginia R. Terris has
published four collections of poetry. Her work has appeared in many
journals and anthologies, such as The Nation, The New Yorker, and
New Letters. She compiled Meaningful Differences: The Poetry and
Prose of David Ignatow (1994), edited his At My Ease: Uncollected
Poems of the Fifties and Sixties (1998), and co-edited his last
collection, Living Was What I Wanted (1999). She has also written
many articles and reviews for journals and encyclopedia.
|
