19-15



Dover Peach
with a thumb to the nose toward Matthew Arnold and Anthony Hecht

They never told you my name
when they invaded the anthologies.

Doing me such favors, those two:
a weekend trip to the coast,
a bottle of the wrong perfume.
A girl does her best,
but to go down in history invisibly,
without even a name, is too much.

There was never a question
of a fruitful relationship—
and all that complaining

about the world in general
and a few things in particular
war and suffering and all that
as though Matthew thought of them first.

Tony was no better, expecting me
to drop everything and start cooking
when he showed up like a dog on the doorstep
needing my life to juice his own ambition.

The nerve to claim my reality
without asking. You'll be glad to know
I've given up poets to buy
my own ticket, dance my dance,
walk past their erection, a fence

they built themselves. I wrote on it:
For a good time call Matt or Tony
555-3825.

by Sandra Soli

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Sandra Soli, writer/editor in Edmond, Oklahoma, enjoys wordplay and terrible puns. Her poems, articles, and short fiction have appeared widely in journals, humanities magazines, and anthologies that benefit the homeless. Author of two award-winning poetry chapbooks and teaching artist, Sandy survived childhood in a war zone and is completing a poetry collection based on that experience.