An edit of a previous poem:
How to Show Your Mother She Raised You Right
1—Be Well Read
Make sure she sees you
with a hardback once a week (try
some moony Whitman or savory Cervantes)
and hide Fabio-embossed
dust jackets. Know who Emily Post is.
Read Country Gardens and Vogue. Rattle
off the two species of Gallberry and identify
the stitch of a real Chanel. Translate
poems into languages her mouth can't handle—
Urdu or something sub-Saharan.
Study the obstinacy of kiwi bristles
and avoid the scowl of a lemon wedge. Always
have the intimacy of banana curves
at your fingertips. Know her birthday. Forget her age.
2—Be Clean and Neat
Exfoliate. Don't suck down your Evian
like Gatorade. Agree
that wicker furniture isn’t ugly. Agree
that the neighbor with her oversized dogs
and chicken-fried-chicken odor
is white trash, but don't describe
the smell of her nephew’s trailer hazy with spent
menthols, or the taste of Van Gogh
Vodka from his heated mouth in the torn
backseat of a Honda Accord. Wear floral prints,
A-line skirts. Agree that you won't talk
to the gardener while he’s working.
3—Converse Well
Call about her everyday
minutiae. Don’t tell her that she repeats
stories like writing lines in detention.
Don’t interrupt. Answer questions vaguely. Tell her
about a man hitting passengers on the bus
with dirty pink flip-flop heels,
sagging in his ragged airbrushed
t-shirt. Don’t mention that you bought
him a meal. Drink Moscato with dinner.
Listen to her mascara shade lectures.
Speak badly about your father, reaffirm
what a terrible choice she made, that he’s
got his fifth floozy already hanging
on every arm he sticks out.
Christine, your reworking of the previous draft really shows. I particularly like the three-section format of this piece, the sort of magazine-list parody it demonstrates. You’ve got a great ear and eye for how lines flow and sound—“savory Cervantes,” “Urdu or something sub-Saharan.” Really, there are too many lines for me to pick and choose all the good ones—this draft overflows with them.
ReplyDeleteJust some local things, since overall I find the piece satisfying: first stanza, the “intimacy of banana curves,” “obstinacy of kiwi bristles,” and “the scowl of a lemon wedge.” I think you may have one too many “the _______ of _________” combinations going on there. I love “the scowl of a lemon wedge” and the banana bit—maybe snip that kiwi bristles one. Also “mascara shade lectures” in stanza three—rhythm might be a tad off. The inflection feels odd to me – maybe a bit of rephrasing there? One last note—the backseat of cars for illicit sexual activities, while accurate, seems a little expected. I like the addition of “Honda Accord,” it spices that part up a bit, however, it might still be a too available.
Wonderful writing. Love this piece.