Martin Scorsese and His Wife

In bed does he shout, “Action!”?
At some point does he say, “Cut,
let’s try that again.”?
I don’t know about you
but I couldn’t handle
242 takes.
Seriously,
do his eyebrows
jump off of his face
and scamper
all across his wife’s body
willy nilly?
I’d just like to know.

The Orange Wedge Sues for Equal Time

I am much more handsome
on this oriental plate
than the light brown curved
fortune cookies here beside me,
with their slips of paper
issuing from their lips
like tiny square insolent tongues.

I am fresh.
I am organic.
My color is brighter.
My scent is captivating.
I am a natural source of fiber.
I am rich in Vitamin C.

Yet hands always move toward
the cookie
instead of me,
though they sometimes take me
as an afterthought.
Second best.

All right. Go on. Believe
that silly slip of paper.
Crunch crunch those empty calories

bereft of zest
and homely.
They won’t cure scurvy.

————

Sharon E. Svendsen has published fiction, articles, and over 200 poems in literary magazines and many other periodicals and anthologies. Her work has most recently been published in Plainsongs, Rat’s Ass Review, Feathertale #15 and #16, Spank the Carp, Decasp, Poetry Corners, and Ars Poetica. She continually fights off hungry Martian agents of doom, knowing they don’t read poetry, they eat it.