National Poetry Month’s Poem-A-Day 30-Day Challenge: Day 20
SEAT BELT
Helicoptering would be mild
in describing the ways she micro-managed
each detail of her teen boy’s life.
To ward off trouble, rife and wild
in a menacing, unpredictable world,
she would keep him safe, keep him proper:
which friends, this author, no contact sports, no cable,
web-browsing only at the kitchen table,
texts screened, email read, homework monitored, early to bed.
It may be why he loved looking at the stars
out his second story window at night.
Or why he might open it up to the wind,
his desk-papers fluttering like ducks at a gun.
And why sometimes on the way to some place
for something in his schedule maternally required
he would, quiet as a lover eloping,
hoping for a perfect escape,
undo his seatbelt with a smirk on his face.