March Snowballs

Kathy is a waitress,
tray loaded, tired,
eight hours into a five hour shift,
a night of drinking still in her head.

A sneakered foot catches on
a beige wrinkle in the dining room carpet.
Four plates filled with yellow eggs,
red home fries and brown meat,
meant for the conspirators
hunched around table seven,
crash to the ground,
like a symphony tumbling off a cliff.

Michael argues his suicide with indecision.
Sitting on a couch of rough avocado cloth,
a 45 in his lap,
talking for what seems like hours,
but it’s only been three minutes.

“Why shouldn’t I?” he says,
“You’ve been asking for months
and I’m tired of hearing your voice
inside my head.”
Only a letter from his little sister
keep his hands clenched by his sides.

Frank’s been injecting since he was 14;
and what’s so crazy about that?
Stealing for a fix is just what you do;
besides, grandma has so many pills
she’d never miss a few.

Thirty bucks each for Percocet*
and only eight for the fix;
people should admire his thrift
and sense of economics.

We are snowballs made in March,
rolled by children eager for another throw,
a thin layer of winter’s last white gasp,
collecting bits of twig, grey grass
and pebbles along the way;
never meant to be perfect,
only to be loved for the arc we make
across the steel grey sky.

*PERCOCET® is a Registered Trademark of Endo Pharmaceuticals Inc.