My Family

We’re at a Cuban restaurant on North Avenue
my mom is staring at the plantains and commenting
on how much they look like little potato pancakes
and my dad is telling the owner why she needs to charge
a corkage fee so he can bring his own wine
and my brother’s telling me I need to clean my glasses
and we get into an argument about the Hawaiian Punch guy
and my family’s laughing at me cus I remembered him
having antlers on his head and my dad goes “no it was a
porkpie hat” and then my mom and dad start complaining about
my brother needing to find an apartment on campus in
time “I’m gonna say this once and then let it go…”
which my dad says with everything he complains about
repeatedly and then my mom starts in on how she
can’t believe my aunt and uncle took a trip to
Tokyo for a friend’s wedding my aunt and uncle
who have a mansion in Glenview and another somewhere
in Colorado and my dad says “because they can”
and my mom says “but I just don’t get it. I would
never go to an employee’s wedding in Tokyo” and my
dad says “well they’re friends” and my mom goes
“well I still don’t get it” and my dad goes “well I
guess that’s just one of life’s great mysteries”
but my mom says she still doesn’t get it
and my dad closes his eyes and breathes deeply
and we go and my mom makes my brother
straighten the blinds each one individually so they’re
all perfectly even and I ask “why is she making you
do that?” and my brother goes “because she’s fucking crazy”
and my dad makes my brother and I haul a hundred-pound
disassembled wine rack downstairs and he’s too tired to
take me home so my brother takes me home and we talk
the whole ride there about poker and getting laid
in college and he drops me off I go in crack open
a bottle of whiskey take a stiff shot and write this poem

© 2008 Lee Kitzis