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Hope and Compulsion
Poetry by Rodger LeGrand
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Excerpts
Dying Mouse by Vending Machine
A small crowd forms a circle,
looks down at its little heaves
and inaudible gasps. A suicide jump
from the top of the glass case
filled with hunks of chocolate
wrapped in paper?
Overwhelmed
by the Ring Dings
and Snickers?
Or was it something else,
poison, maybe, spilling
into its lungs, forced
through its body
by its own heart?
Some coworker,
I don’t remember his name,
picked it up by the tail
and cradled it
in a brown paper towel.
Gentle handling of a meaningless existence.
Then he said,
“let’s see if the toilet
can handle it,”
and walked into the restroom.
Coffee break’s over.
Time to get back to work.
Mrs. Brocollini Said
The parties were always bigger
when we were younger.
You remember the parties
we used to have, the family parties?
When Bobby would come up from DC
and Nelly would come out
from Albany? The old days.
Nobody comes around anymore.
The holidays are just me
and my brother, Pete.
You should see him now, eyes
all swollen up with the cataracts.
Oh, but back when the kids were young,
back before Stan's heart attack
left me with Pete.... Those were parties.
The kids would make a mess of everything.
I used to get so mad...all that hard work
smashed to the floor.
I would give anything
for the kids to be small again
and to wake up in the morning
and have a cup of coffee with Stan.
Anything to go back there. But now
the kids all have their own kids
and don't come around much.
I get to see them maybe once a year,
and most years not even around the holidays.
That's what happens when everyone moves
and gets older. Husbands die
and the parties get smaller.
You spend more time alone
with nothing but your thoughts.
Thinking about what, I'm not sure.
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