Supermarket Sweep, 1994—Jeffrey Hecker   

Abundant and considerate, first starlight, so why on earth,

as Mom races to fill her cart with Tomahawk steaks and slips,

does no solitary bystander assist her oblique fractured patella?

Not host Mark Ruprecht’s wide neck tie.  Not shopping partner

Uncle Jerry, stuck in console at storefront.  Jerry can smell only

Millstone Coffee dispenser, hear countdown timer Johnny Gilbert

narrate over copyright infringed sped up Kraftwerk.  Nine cameras

continue rolling as Mom crawls epoxy floor.  Winning nametag Vicki

maneuvers around Mom’s body that eventually hugs some retractable stanchion.

Jeffrey Hecker is the author of Rumble Seat (San Francisco Bay Press), the chapbooks Hornbook (Horse Less Press), Instructions for the Orgy (Sunnyoutside Press), and Ark Aft (The Magnificent Field). Recent work appears in South Dakota Review. A fourth-generation Hawaiian-American, he teaches at The Muse Writers Center and reads for Quarterly West.

Published by laurenalwan