confetti - Party Line

by Craig Kirchner

“Party Line” by Craig Kirchner

The huge brown poles stuck every half block,
connected everything with tattered wires,
vee-ing down the row house alleys
to Lincoln logs on the horizon –
well, Mannasota Ave., anyway –
and then across the Atlantic.
They say the President
will be able to talk
to the Kremlin.

And now we’re squatting under our desks,
facing away from the windows,
heads between our knees in
Mrs. Sinton’ 3^rd grade –
she called it an
air raid drill.

I’ve killed enough Germans and Japs with
Vic Morrow-like machine-gun cool,
in fox holes under those poles, that
they shouldn’t be a threat –
but this enemy, was more
dangerous and
different.

Checking out the upskirt on that cold hardwood floor,
I whispered to Linda Perry with her buck teeth,
and albino blonde hair that this was nothing
to worry about, now that we could talk
to the Russians on the phone and all.
Then, as an afterthought, I informed
her that I would be majoring in
Political Science in college,
thinking it must be
pretty big shit.