Rosemary Dunn Moeller

Why You Asked

Middle school lunchroom round table
of girls in jeans and glitter tops with messages.
Darla doesn’t eat.
Instead she takes out a darning needle
explains the piercing to wide-eyed friends
and shoves it into her mouth through her right cheek
ready to insert a pin and plug for fashion’s effect.
Her mother wouldn’t let her get it done at the mall.
Her friends watch in amazement,
giggling squeals, until the lunchroom teacher
comes over, seeing the blood on her cheek,
the grimace of unsuccessful pain
from cartilage and skin that wouldn’t cooperate.
You watched, not adding to the noise,
just part of the guiltless audience.
Darla tried to do it, but
she’s okay.
She’s  normal, no problems
 in Darla’s life. Maddie says It’s no big deal
like the teacher thinks, making a scene of taking Darla out.
She just wanted to pierce her cheek
nothing else, nothing more sad or sinister in a twelve year old’s eyes.
She’s okay at school, okay at home, I guess.
She just pierced her cheek with a darning needle.
No big deal. Why not do it if she wants to?
Why the cut on the leg, the chewing flesh on fingers, scaring?
Why are you talking to me about it, Maddie?

Dinner for Eight Civilized Guests

While cutting up carrots for salad
I sliced open my finger, winced in pain
and watched the blood drip onto the lettuce.
The red on green looked vinegary, appropriate.

It was all the lettuce I had
so I tossed it up, let it go.
The guests would never know,
unless I told them. I donate blood regularly

for strangers, generously, freely.
Friends might understand,
accept, receive.
I don’t know. Didn’t ask.

Every three months, the solicitation comes.
I arrive, officially identify myself to people I know,
take the required handouts,
answer the drug/sex questions without pauses,
pretend to be unannoyed.

I lie down to be poked and pumped,
while chatting about kids, teams and shopping,
pummel the stress ball for a few minutes
while flowing away to some unknown place
for purposes I don’t think about
in spaces I never want to be found.
Blood stops being mine, becomes orphaned, once
out of my body. No longer my problem.

Back at the hospitality table
I imbibe, inhale, ingest and disappear
out the door.
I’m not fooled by the sterility
and clinical presence of the site.
It’s like my kitchen. Like
the carrot and arrugula salad. 

All poems ©Rosemary Dunn Moeller

Back | Home