Woman Hanging Laundry
By Ryan Quinn Flanagan
Woman hanging laundry
like messiahs
along the line,
do not forget to use those clothes pins
in your teeth
like your mother
and her mother
and all the mothers
that came
before.
String your bed sheets up –
like Mussolini –
for all to see,
then move along to those
corduroy slacks.
Woman hanging laundry,
make sure all your socks
match.
And do not forget
to take down your dainties
before dark.
Such things
have a funny way
of disappearing.
Ryan Quinn Flanagan lives deep in the Canadian Shield with his cat Wolfgang and his muse. He writes poems when he can’t sleep and is deathly allergic to green bell peppers.