Nancy Devine - January 2008
 
EXCRETA

 
 

My husband says Madonna is a turd
in his brain. And I get this picture
of a strand of dung floating up
through a wet web of firing synapses:
wife connects to placeCityNancy, marriage twelve
years, residence placeCityGrand Forks, name Chuck,
alphabet soup of tax information, social security
data in his psychic bowl, 

Mrs. Guy Ritchie the one wanton wonton of waste in
this percolating consommé of my husband’s thought.
Understand that he feels no malice
toward her or any of her fabulous, famous friends,
the ones who clip trends
to their lapels and then run right through the TV
into our living rooms so we can divine
what color to brush our hair, how low to go
with pants. He simply can’t see the utility
of celebrity, self-ordained or otherwise. 

This spring, a rabbit nest near our dogs’ kennel;
our bearded collie pawed through
air diamonds of chain link fence at her babies.
My husband carefully scooped up home and offspring
with a shovel and carried all to a cover beneath
a lilac bush, new digs for bunnies whose foreplay
will include snacking on shoots
of whatever we plant, even  

moss roses. Madonna would be lucky
if my husband were a turd in her brain
or a man with a shovel
trying to save at least
some of what’s irritating
about us. 
 
 
 
 

Nancy Devine teaches high school English in Grand Forks, North Dakota, where she lives with her husband Chuck and their two dogs, Whitey and Yo-yo. She co-directs the Red River Valley Writing Project, a local site of the National Writing Project. Her poems have appeared recently in Bear River Journal, Main Channel Voices, Matter 09: Fuel. and 42opus. She has work forthcoming in The Minnetonka Review and VOX.