Minor Chores
I
My father used to call the tops of acorns
little elves hats, and when the trees turned
in the fall he called the color
chartreuse. My mother used to call my father
whenever she needed a wasp killed,
so she could pick herself
up off the grass . . . or carpet . . . or wherever
she had thrown her allergic body
to find refuge from
Vermin. My father always liked them. He
used to talk about their value
in the garden and how good they were
to eat in Thailand during Vietnam. He knew
they always had some job to do and I knew that
He was the Devil incarnate. Only because he was an atheist
and grew foods organically, which just didn’t seem
natural to a teenager who wanted a father
just like every other father who worked
in an office. N...