Just Another Shift

On the streets, these crowded lines of stores
and delivery trucks idling, the backfire
of my manager’s Chevy is my father’s hand
waking us for school as if everything was right
and our own car, a Buick, started every morning.

Behind the restaurant, next to the dump,
our cooks take turns smoking
sitting on five gallon drums beating
their knuckles against the rims.
They laugh again in the kitchen
with their hands spotted with blood.

I serve another dinner. Check water.
Once I waited on an old lady,
dressed in a blue gown from before I was born,
here celebrating her dead husband’s birthday.
She drank three whiskeys and a gimlet
for herself. She doesn’t remind me

of family. But she still remains
at every table I greet. Her dress has faded
to tones matching her husband’s face. She asks
before I can speak, and what will we have?
Knowing full well that bones will come.

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Nicholas Reading is a pretty big deal. Just ask him. He is the author of the chapbook The Party In Question (Burnside Review Press, 2007). His poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Bat City Review, jubilat, Nimrod, Painted Bride Quarterly, and San Pedro River Review. He also serves as the Managing Editor for Sport Literate. His most recent chapbook, Love & Sundries, is scheduled to release by Split Lip Press in November 2014. Visit him at nickreading.com.