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Museum

The kid and the dad ride the trolley to the museum
red line green line jiggles and shakes
right to front door
with the statue of the Indian on a horse
rain splatters the Indian’s chest.

Inside big doors         marble and polished
wood and gilt        paintings everyway
even on the ceiling
the kid always impressed.

Kid and dad hustle though 
Tapestry room all chills
walls of stone    
the dad never lets the kid look.

The dad has own way
round the circle stairway
Monet’s        haystacks
the Catherdral at Rouen
the dad talks light and time
changes what we see.
The kid thinks, yeah so does
rain and cloud
change to dark.

The dad always turns right
into realism       impressionism.
Kid knows the isms
and artists       on first name basis
Claude, Edwarde, Pierre, Vincent.
The kid dawdles picture to picture
up long hall    farmyards, flowers,
moonlight and mountain
sneaks peaks down the hall
where Suzanne dances
getting bigger with each step.
The dad tells stories about the artists
Suzanne the favorite model.
The kid thinks beautiful
The kid thinks love.

Straws

Spat and gag
the kid splutters mouthful
            cross table
kid knows dark
            knows crawling inside
         inside then out.
                                                         Insect
scurriescrosstable.

The ma annoyed
         wipes rag        cross milky puddle
leaves stick      leaves tack
blur of sweet tea.        

Roach    the kid yells
in straw          in mouth
alive       kid knows
                                    fear inside out
                                    outside in.

The ma shrugs
pissed at mess
            the kid made.

School

The kid looks at the pictures in the primer
Maple Street        white houses
green shutters        trees

Who lives like that?     kid asks
wishin      to be someplace
that’s not apartment.      

Gravel backyard where the cars park
including the dad’s Pontiac with the light
up indian.

See Puff run
Run run run

Who talks like that?       kid asks.
Like askin God
not ‘spectin answers.

Even the dad pissed bout Maple Street
in schools where kids don’t live like that
not that it matters         much.

The dad pissed bout lots a stuff
but don’t never do nothing bout it
like when kid n dad shop for a plant
for grandma        mother’s day
kid thinks one with pretty red flowers nice
but the grandma     yelled    gave it back.
How the kid know the grandma hates flowers?

Or the time kid picks out the shiny gold rollin-
pin with the ball-bearings.
Grandma waves her ole wooden pin in the air
says she not needen any new pin
this one works fine.

The dad mumbles all the way home
kid knows dad scared too.

Eve Rifkah is  editor of the literary journal Diner and co-founder of Poetry Oasis, Inc., a non-profit poetry association dedicated to education, promoting local poets and publishing Diner. Poems have or will appear in Bellevue Literary Review, The MacGuffin, 5 AM, Parthenon West, newversenews.com, poetrymagazine.com,  Chaffin Journal, Porcupine Press, The Worcester Review, California Quarterly,  ReDactions, Jabberwock Review, Southern New Hampshire Literary Journal. They have also been translated into Braille. Her chapbook At the Leprosarium won the 2003 Revelever chapbook contest. She is a professor of English at Worcester and Fitchburg State Colleges and a workshop instructor. She received her MFA in Writing from Vermont College and lives with her husband, poet Michael Milligan.