Greek Drama

Their bedroom lay in perfect symmetry, A mythic stage. The double bed was flanked on each side by a dresser, lamp and closet. She'd spout her lines from her side, he from his. Some trivial thing seemed always to begin it: 'How can you wear that jacket with those pants? ' — Or, 'Can't you wear your hair all the way back? ' (His mother wore her hair all the way back.) Annoyance soon gave way to full-blown rage. Backing toward her closet as she shouted, She opened it one day, for ammunition, And started hurling purses from the shelf. Clear, hard-plastic scored a direct hit Upon his forehead. Down he fell, and lay Like a crashed airplane in a lonely field. I stood above his body. Was he dead? Soon, though, he woke, stood up, and went to work. That night, we all had mom's pot roast for supper. Not a word about the morning's 'little tiff'.