Little kernels of corn explode. My mother’s nose sweats,
her calm spirals into a scarlet cyclone,
those nights we popped and buttered popcorn,
then sat waiting for my father,
waiting to stick ourselves to those leather seats
in his grey Cortina, clip speakers to the windows,
and eat popcorn at the drive-in movie.
His arrival depended on the law of averages,
and statistics strongly supported non-arrival.
Evenings we sat believing it would be different.
How could he not come? He was a kite,
dancing in our clouds. How could we not see
that we clenched the fraying thread of a high flyer;
a flamboyant cockerel parading in sunshine with his floozies.
Ah Fatthaa! How could you? How could you?