Counselor

by Gale Acuff

It's not that we don't love you, Mother says,

but we don't love each other anymore.

I stand before her and Father. They sit

on the newly reupholstered sofa.

They sit real close not to like each other.

That's right, son, Father says--your mother's right.

Oh, I say, my hands behind my back and

my bladder filling up. I hope I don't

pee my pants but I'm a little nervous.

What we've decided to do, Mother says,

is separate a while. Right, Father says

--I'll be living somewhere else for a spell

but I'll be over Sundays to see you.

Sundays. That's when God rests. Ed Sullivan

is on TV then. And if I have homework

on the weekend I do it Sunday nights.

Oh, I echo--I don't know what to say

but I ought to make a sound to stay in

practice and Oh's as good as anything

--it makes a big hole of my mouth and holds

everything else I could think of to add

if only I could think. If I've got them

right, Mother and Father hate each other

but they both love me. And I love them, too.

Suddenly I feel old, as old as God.

If you loved me you would love each other,

I blurt. I don't know how I know that but

it's so. They look at the rug. I look, too,

but faster. When I look at them again

they're still looking down. Mother starts to cry

and Father puts his arm around her. She

moves closer to him. Now they both hate me.

That's more like it. They're going to be fine.

© 2011 Gale Acuff

Gale Acuff has poetry published in Ascent, Ohio Journal, Descant, Adirondack Review, Worcester Review, Verse Wisconsin, Maryland Poetry Review, Florida Review, South Carolina Review, Carolina Quarterly, Poem, Amarillo Bay, South Dakota Review, Santa Barbara Review,Sequential Art Narrative in Education and many other journals.

She has authored three books of poetry: Buffalo Nickel (BrickHouse Press, 2004), The Weight of the World (BrickHouse, 2006), and The Story of My Lives (BrickHouse, 2008).

She has taught university English in the US, China, and the Palestinian West Bank.

She is an American teaching in China. She is interested in recalling childhood experiences and trying to recognize something extraordinary in them.