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The Exterminator

 

 

You see? You have to do it a second time.

You might not get them all out at once.

 

I marveled at my father spraying my apartment

for roaches, a busman’s holiday, Sunday. 

 

He came to deverminize my studio 

his one day off from work, this tiny studio

 

inhabited by me, the daughter he sent to college

on money he earned from spraying roaches 

 

in the Bowery, in Chinatown, in elegant French restaurants 

at night so the customers wouldn’t see —.

 

I tried my hand at a career in which no one 

made any money because if you grow up 

 

with men like my father, you somehow feel 

money will come. Mostly, it did.  

 

And there I was after college, fighting 

for the revolution while my father,

 

teaching me how you had to spray twice, 

to get out all the roaches, do the job well

 

no matter how small, worked 

while the moon rose and fell

 

just so I could have the luxury 

of throwing it back in his face.

 

At night, after cleaning my apartment,

he fell asleep listening to Brahms. â€‹

A version of this poem originally appeared in Coneflower Cafe Spring 2022 (Page 9)

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