A Heather McHugh Poem

The Oven Loves the TV Set

Stuck on the fridge, our favorite pin-up girl
is anorexic. On the radio we have a riff

of Muzak sax, and on the mind
a self-help book. We sprawl all evening, all

alone, in the unraised ranch;
all day the company we kept

kept on incorporating. As for the world
of poverty, we did our best, thanks

to a fund of Christian feeling
and mementos from

Amelia, the foster child, who has
the rags and seven photogenic sisters we prefer

in someone to be saved. She's proof
Americans have got a heart

to go with all that happy
acumen you read about. We're known to love

a million little prettinesses,
decency, and ribbons on

the cockapoo. (But who
will study alphabets for hands? Who gives

a damn what patience goes into
a good wheelchair? Who lugs the rice

from its umpteen stores
to the ends of the earth, to even

one dead-end? Not we.)
Our constitutional pursuit

is happiness, i.e.
somebody nice, and not

too fat, we can have
for our personal friend.


(1994)