Triple Feature
Saturday afternoons for $1.50
we would sit through three movies
end-to-end just like the days
that came between Saturdays.
Ferrera Pan red hots and Atomic
Jawbreakers tie-dyed our fingers,
so we sucked the sugar off them
and wiped our spit on the seats.
Popcorn came in foot-tall cups
but was gone before the previews ended.
Cokes went even faster than
the monsters lined up on the screen.
Everything came in threes:
Horror of, Terror of, Bride of Dracula
Hand of, Curse of, Tomb of The Mummy
Waiting, watching, waiting again
Sometimes I think I'm still in the second row
watching the second movie. The first one ended
about the same time the Strand theater closed.
The third one, the last one, the main event,
will start when I'm ready to go but know
that something bigger is coming.
This is the middle one:
Terror of Something or Other
Curse of Something Even Worse
And I'm glued to my seat,
licking syrupy colors off my fingers,
wondering who sat here last week.