I’m old enough to remember when plastic seemed marvelous.
A flick of the wrist and leftovers stayed left over.
My grandmother in her last good years asking
how many girlfriends I had. I don’t
save money the way I should. Once,
a pizza box wedged the fridge open
overnight. Which wouldn’t have been a problem
if all we’d had in there had been
the plastic lilacs, but the milk went bad.
And the eggs. The birds seemed angrier than usual
the next morning, but the pizza was still good.
I’m old enough to remember when the internet
should have seemed miraculous, but we
took it as our birthright, our quid pro
the quotidian of complacency. Well, people
get used to all sorts of things. Look how fast
we can change channels. A Tupperwared
response when my grandmother asks
whether I’m saving money. I had a girlfriend once
who loved lilacs. Of the two dozen poems that begin
I’m old enough to remember when plastic seemed marvelous
how many end with and it still does?
Michael Berkowitz is a poet, web developer and aspiring trapeze artist. He lives in Somerville, Massachusetts. His work has most recently appeared in Sixfold.
