Friday Night Fire by Mary Ray Goehring

Friday Night Fire

        After When I Was Conceived by Michael Ryan

July 1950. An evening breeze off
Lake Michigan ruffles the cotton
kitchen curtains in their third-floor apartment—
the ones she sewed on his sister’s machine.
They were in Kenosha, perhaps a Friday,
his Western Electric work week finished
as was their meatless meal of salmon
patties, baked beans and bread baked
that afternoon, the smell still scenting the room.
My brother already in bed.
Mom, apron tied around her waist, washing
dishes at the sink, strands
of hair slip bobby pins
frame her smiling face
Jack Benny jokes on the radio.
My father smokes a Pall Mall at the table
as she suggests a picnic at Simmons
Island beach for tomorrow.
He tells her he loves her potato salad
snuffs his cigarette in the ashtray
walks behind her
wraps her in his arms
presses against her ample hips.
Dishes forgotten in the suds-filled sink.

*

Mary Ray Goehring has been, for the last 20 years, a snowbird migrating between her home state of Wisconsin and East Texas. For family reasons, she has now permanently moved to the pine forests of East Texas. She writes primarily about nature, family and friends. You can find her work in several print and online journals and anthologies such as: ONE ART: a journal of poetry, A Path to Kindness – edited by James Crews, The Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Moss Piglet, The Blue Heron Review, Bramble, Your Daily Poem, The Rye Whiskey Review, Steam Ticket Review, Texas Poetry Calendar and others.