Coin collecting and prostitution
The two sides of Janus, an institution.
Categories:
coin collecting, corruption, poetry,
Form: Couplet
Her parents’ patterns were easy to learn.
Mom did the cooking, cleaning, laundry.
Working nonstop from the minute she woke
To the minute she fell exhausted into bed.
Her dad was the lucky one.
He worked during the day but the nights were his.
He had hobbies – fishing, hunting, trapping, coin collecting.
He listened to music and tried to dance.
But not with Mom because she never stopped working.
She worked from the second she awoke until the second she went to bed.
As far as their daughter could tell, life for a woman was no life at all.
So she faded her parents’ examples and went out on her own.
Determined to not have the cleanest clothes or cleanest house.
Determined to not cook and bake and iron and vacuum every waking minute.
Her light, happy, airy do-whatever-I-want lifestyle made her mother smile.
Her piggery disgusted her father, who now had six more hobbies.
She did not care, glad to escape the drudgery of a home where
Daddy did whatever he wanted most of the day
While her mother worked tirelessly to cook and clean and dust.
Stopping finally when she was dead, not enjoying life at all.
Categories:
coin collecting, 10th grade, 11th grade,
Form: Prose Poetry