wk 4 imitation 1 by liz snader

Early Saturday morning by Liz Snader

I used to applaud my pa and his brother

For getting up early on Saturday morning

And casting reels at their spot

But now I am not one of those people.

No one else cares about my young aspirations

But they go on judging me all day

Like a bee who tries to pick the perfect flower

And passed by the dandelion.

It’s like this-just when you think

You’ve got it all,

That life has stopped fucking with you,

Reality hits and you wake up

Quick enough to see your days slip

Away from you and become reality

Just like the Christmas present

Santa gave you when you were 10.

And now I sit in a well lit

Fast food place full of last people

Where the windows are covered in advertisement

And the air smells of grease and body odor.

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Early Sunday Morning

BY EDWARD HIRSCH

I used to mock my father and his chums

for getting up early on Sunday morning

and drinking coffee at a local spot

but now I’m one of those chumps.

No one cares about my old humiliations

but they go on dragging through my sleep

like a string of empty tin cans rattling

behind an abandoned car.

It’s like this: just when you think

you have forgotten that red-haired girl

who left you stranded in a parking lot

forty years ago, you wake up

early enough to see her disappearing

around the corner of your dream

on someone else’s motorcycle

roaring onto the highway at sunrise.

And so now I’m sitting in a dimly lit

café full of early morning risers

where the windows are covered with soot

and the coffee is warm and bitter.