Celebrate National Poetry Month with us and enjoy a Poetry Per Diem each day for the month of April!
Today’s poem is from Tina Cane’s book of poems titled Once More with Feeling.
 
A Minor History of Bodega
 
More a mindset the bodega was where you could get Lemonheads
 
and Mary Janes        a set of radial tires a pack of Rough Riders
 
and bottles of pineapple douche       or for two quarters a half-pint
 
of chocolate milk to wash down       your Roland’s Fried Pork Rinds
 
just in time for Michael Aguirre to follow up on his promise
 
to punch you in the face which you had dared him to do which he
 
later did      against the brick wall near Faye’s place so when your mother
 
her eyes still set on her sizzling wok       said What did you expect?
 
you just had to snag a stack of quarters from her bag        so you could
 
stomp back to the corner for a box of Red Hots and sit on the steps
 
of the Laundromat sucking the color from each bit of sweet
 
before shooting it       from between your teeth onto the sidewalk
 
until the pavement around your feet was a dingy constellation charting
 
your indifference towards any transaction      that didn’t first pass
 
beneath a pane of bulletproof glass
 
This book can be found in the Island Free Library
collection, upstairs under call number 811.6 CAN. Stay tuned for another poem tomorrow!