In the final dying days
of my grad school career
on a break one afternoon
I wandered lonely
to the vending machines
where a classmate struggled
to buy an ice cream
from a dispenser
with raised buttons
requiring a firm push,
like the keys
on a manual typewriter,
but instead she barely
touched the button
for her selection,
brushing her finger
across it like a dragonfly
alighting on a flower,
and all the while she brayed
I can’t get it!
and It won’t come out!
until finally she slunk away,
defeated, at which point
I stepped right up
to the machine
and depressed the button
and took her junk food
and ate it,
and it was good.
Dawn Corrigan’s poetry and prose have appeared widely in print and online. Her masthead credits include Western Humanities Review, Girls with Insurance, and Otis Nebula, where she currently serves as assistant editor. She works in the affordable housing industry and lives in Myrtle Grove, FL. Find her online at www.dawncorrigan.com.