Mastication and Muzak
We sit across from each other
Under the glaring fluorescent light
At the glass-topped wrought-iron kitchen table
With the black, metal coils of the upright chair
Snaking into my back like a warning
If I make any attempt to lean back
And breathe.
After repositioning the ceramic bowl with the purple silk flowers
With their blotched, angry bruises
Onto the grey granite countertop behind the table
There is now a place for the handcrafted black walnut salad bowl
Filled with verdant leafiness
And incongruous bursts of juicy cherry tomatoes
Drizzled with earthy brown balsamic vinaigrette.
The cheerful palette is misleading
Since it suggests signs of life
And not the life support
That is more accurately represented
By this tableau
Especially by the plate across the table
With its barely cooked animal carcass
Masquerading as sustenance,
And I can barely swallow.
In the next room
Innocuous instrumentals fill the empty spaces
That words once inhabited
And I no longer wonder how it happened
Or when it happened
Because no timer was set
That signaled the end of it all.
But echoes of the fury
And pain
That once flooded the halls
And every room of the house
Like raging rivers
And the jolts of slamming doors
That were earthquakes
Still remain
But they have long been eroded
Into the numbing trickle of mastication
And Muzak.
- © Nancy Machlis Rechtman 2022
Nancy Machlis Rechtman has had poetry and short stories published in Paper Dragon, The Bluebird Word, Quail Bell, The Bluebird Word, Goat’s Milk, The Writing Disorder, Discretionary Love, and more. She wrote freelance Lifestyle stories for a local newspaper, and she was the copy editor for another paper She writes a blog called Inanities at https://nancywriteon.wordpress.com.
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