Sometimes Unhappiness Can Make You Mean

by | Jun 9, 2020 | Issue Fifteen, Poetry

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.

Read more Issue Fifteen | Poetry

Or check out the archives

Pin It on Pinterest