How bored God must be

Douglas Silver

 

Watching us trip over ourselves daily,
Thinning the dirt over our faces
Instead of wiping it away.

As if we're only perfecting
The art of kissing our feet.
Oh, how he must tire of hearing

My wife's muffled cries when
She covers her face and runs from the room
After I hit her, not unlike my neighbor's wife

Who bawls over the flowerbeds when she gardens,
Oversized sunglasses concealing her eyes.
How is my mistress, bare-assed and on her knees,

Any different than his?
The way we hush our voices when they call,
The trinkets with which we shower them,

The skimpy negligees in which we dress them,
The perverse requests we make
To surfeit our middle-aged libidos.

Like the bomb in my basement,
No different than that in his,
Or the ones strapped to the foundations

Of every home on this street and across,
Emergent and feeding and
Patiently ticking away.