appealing

The Maynard
Spring 2020

griffin epstein
0:00
 
 

Family Dinner

We watch TV

                              I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter
and the endless debate about eggs

I write a letter to the woman on screen, asking

                                                       what do you have for breakfast? and
                                                       how long can you grow your hair?

Sometimes
we are permitted to eat:

                                                       white chocolate (2 squares)
                                                       Elmer’s glue (1 capful)
                                                       frozen fish fingers (3 on a paper towel)

Eventually they will notice our bodies

                                        (which have started to glow at night)

We won’t have to crawl beneath the window
to hide from the binocular creep across the street

Someday
we will have new shoes
they will be heavy
with bones inside
and we will walk

For now, we hunger
turn the TV up louder
pretend:

                                                       See that lady? She is beautiful.
                                                       You know, it’s okay to be beautiful but
                                                       you do not have to be