Beth figured she’d marry a man with a full tool box
capable of building a house anvil strong,
                              
a man who’d plug her good and help raise
children with squares jaws,

he’d  praise her Christmas fruitcake,
provide every American good thing;

she added
wrong.

I  hated the scent  of Old Spice and Vick’s
VapoRub in the old couple’s home,
and the stench of ****** diapers

in poverty’s  bedroom, and the stink of
*** and bacon grease in my friend’s
house;  when I remember these

smells I want to throw steel
at glass and cry into
the sun.

Sometimes I smell your hair
and pretend to lay my
chest against you

like on those nights after
building  a pine  fence
around the yard

of  a Baptist preacher’s
house in Georgia
forty miles

from cold beer and café pie,
and then I remember that
was 20 years ago

before you and me
drove different
highways.