They say happiness is an invitation

to your own pig roast.  Not since the wolf

stopped breathing heavily at my door

have I had a visitor, an invitation.

 

I know––I know––pigs are not exactly popular. 

And the old sow said there’d be days like this

sitting by the fire looking through snapshots

of my two brothers’ disaster-ridden houses.

 

Still, you can say construction has been

very, very good to me.  It’s kept the wolf

at the door from coming inside, although

I sometimes think it would have been better

 

to be wanted, to have felt his hunger’s

hot breath on my neck just once in my life,

to have been consumed by fire––fear––

love––the apocalypse––or even the wolf––

 

anything––but this comfy boredom

without even a good bedtime story.

 

 

 

© Tim Mayo

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First published in Atlanta Review (2000) & reprinted in The Loneliness of Dogs (Pudding House Publications 2008) & The Equinox (2000)