ENCHILADA NIGHT
I didn’t want my son to be
that kid picking bugs off his t-shirt &
eating them while
sitting in the bleachers with
everybody watching.
But that’s who I have—
an obese, alienated bug-eater.
Low IQ but not low enough for the
Special Ed program.
He’s big for ten but they don’t want
him on the team.
Robert & I walk back to the car;
he said he wished it was Friday already—
Enchilada Night.
I take his hand & guide him to the
parking lot; his hand is sticky but I don’t
want to know why.
We both buckle up. Before I start the car
I tell him that it is Friday—
Enchilada Night &
his eyes light up brighter than any
sphere in the heavens.
I ruffle his hair &
try not to imagine what he has in his mouth.
—from Rattle #49, Fall 2015
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Mike Faran: “I spent much of my childhood in England—attending English schools—and even now in my dotage I find myself being tripped-up by Brit spellings. Just today I wrote ‘realise’ instead of ‘realize.’ I knew early in life that I was in for a war with words. So I became a poet.”