I can bear the cold stupidity of rush-hour traffic,
endure mindless rage from embattled commuters.
I can take orders from crackpots and charlatans,
suffer the drudgery of office politics
and the bruising march to another payday.
I can do that, I tell you. And I can face the terror
of the ordinary citizen and his ordinary ways.
Have I not withstood it these many years?
If it's not too much to ask, my Darling,
would you kindly acquit a few dirty dishes
left in the sink, loose change in the laundry,
forgetting to report that your mother dropped by?
Because I am s-t-a-r-v-e-d for a tender,
graceful touch, My Love, else this tinderbox of a story
could ignite in a desperate and calamitous folly:
MAN GOES BERSERK. SHOOTS TWENTY
IN OFFICE BUILDING. WIFE BITTER
HE LEFT THE TOILET SEAT UP.
**First published in Pearl literary magazine
