Persephone

In the Middle Drawer

84 In the Middle Drawer next to the Depends the satin peach flapper panties. My mother never said the word “orgasm,” never asked me if I had, tho she knew whether or not each man I had was circumcised. Could she, younger than I am when my father fell over into snow on the way to his lawyer weeks before the divorce, have only felt relief at never having to think of condoms or diaphragms. My father was the best she said tho never admitted there were others, only that men 85 want what they can’t have. But she kept that satin as close as her nitroglycerine as if the slippery curves would move into dreams like a voice on radio all night to touch her where she waited like a bride ...