Rochelle Ratner


California Inmate Seeks Release Of Stuffed Dog

The kid left Freckles on the back seat again. She saw
it as she got in, but she was not about to stop and go
back inside. Let her cry her eyes out not having him
to sleep with tonight, that's the babysitter's problem,
not hers. And damn it that kid has got to learn her
lesson. At three or four leaving him in the car was one
thing, but she's seven. Seven going on seventeen, if
you watch that kid preen when there are boys around.
Then she walked into The Iron Horse and of course
George was there, practically avoiding her. How you
can live with someone for six months and then pretend
they don't exist is beyond her. So anyway she had a
few beers and two glasses of Scotch this weirdo bought
her, then left early, thinking she'll head for another bar,
somewhere further out of town. That's when the cops
pulled her over.


Testing

She's been putting the colonoscopy off for three years,
giving one excuse after another. Fasting's not the issue.
Enemas aren't the issue. It's the anesthesia. No, not
even the anesthesia, the I.V. Years ago, they were willing
to just give her a valium and tell her not to move. The
doctor himself called her crazy, but she even enjoyed
watching the little black and green monitor. Then he said
he'd do the test without the anesthesia but not without
the I.V. Something might go wrong. Almost by chance she
found another place that used this new anesthesia that put
her completely out almost the second it pricked her and
let her wake up feeling almost refreshed. Still, she waited,
trying to stall the next test. In the meantime that doctor
moved to a different facility and had no time for that
gentleness she remembered. As she was going under she
heard some strange, disgruntled murmurs. Some flunkie
must have left the case unlocked. Every single scope was
gone.


Piggy Banks

On top of a cabinet in the church's community room were
eight piggy banks the children made themselves, all turned
so they could look out the window. They were supposed to
be piggy banks: one looked more like a giraffe, another
like a poodle. The five- and six-year-olds carefully molded
the clay. The teacher cut holes on the bottom that would
fit the little stoppers bought at K-Mart. The next week the
children painted them. Each Sunday, when they came to
church with their parents, they deposited what coins they
could, saving to help a church three towns over destroyed
by fire. Some of it was money they'd been given for candy
or ice cream. Then one morning the pastor finds shards of
the banks strewn across the floor. He spots a dime as he's
cleaning up. One bank, a blue piggy with bright green eyes,
the thieves must have taken with them. It was the nicest pig
Jake had ever made. His mother offers a ceramic pink piggy
bank from her parents' attic, given to her when she was nine
or ten. But Jake wouldn't be caught dead with a pink bank,
and he doesn't like the stupid way its ears stick out.


Date-A-Dog

She stares at the headline. The thick, heavy lenses of her
bifocals fog. She's so used to being called a dog by the
other kids that she's started thinking of herself that way.
But she knows better than to get her hopes up. She goes
in the bathroom, washes off her glasses, fixes the barrette
that's supposed to keep hair out of her eyes, sits on the
floor with her back against the wall, takes a deep breath,
and picks up the paper again. Oh. It's talking about pets.
Matching dog owners up with other dog owners, sometimes
renting a dog if need be. Even if a puppy was dropped on
her doorstep, she wouldn't want it, though. And just because
you don't like dogs doesn't make you a bad person. It might
even make you a better person. She gets up, rummages in
the bin for last Friday's paper. She remembers reading this,
but wants to read it again just for confirmation. There it is:
in New Orleans there are over 300 volunteers searching for
the pets they have listed as missing, but there's no such list
of missing men and women.


Jealous Lover Program Creator Is Indicted

There was a time when he sent her flowers once a week.
These days mostly it's electronic greeting cards: A Rose
for You, Somebody Loves You, The Star I Wish Upon,
From the Moment We Met, Every Night is Date Night,
Flirtatious Hearts, Picking Up a Love Bug. A field of
lilies spreads across her desktop. A virtual puppy slurps
at the monitor as it tries to kiss her. Two polar bears
hug each other. A Pooh bear, one paw in the honey pot,
stares out at her with those huge, irresistible brown eyes.

-all poems previously published at Cricket Online Review