Bath Night

Bath Night

Sitting on a red vinyl chair set in the middle of the
linoleum kitchen floor my father poised
with his electric clippers and scissors ready
to cut my hair on a Saturday night,
haircuts were at the time of my youth
running at a dollar,
money my father would not spend,
naive, I did not know a bowl job and
had never visited a barber shop,
my blond hair tumbled to the floor
to the whine of the electric motor as Dad inhaled
his Daily Mail self-roll stuck to his lower lip
squinting his eyes in concentration,







My brother soaking in the bath tub
whose water, as the youngest, I would inherit,
after my cut
and he next to the cutting block in exact rotation.

Sunday morning with my hand-me-down Brogues
filled with card board to make them fit
my suit jacket too short, at the sleeves, because
I grew like a Jack Rabbit since Spring.
We jump into the blue 1951 Ford
I, sitting in the front between my parents
off to find out what Jesus would say...




marty