Keep It Down

every time I hiccup I’ll think of you

and your floodpants

your panic at any uncertainty

at your own uncertainty

I’ll think of your mustard sandwiches

you, eating a whole red pepper

chomping on a cucumber, uncut

every time I hiccup I’ll think of you,

hiccuping loudly

keep it down, I’d say,

then smile and squint and

try to keep it in until it all came out

and you’d say, you shut up,

in your work-husband way

I remember when you yelled at me once

and I had to get up to cry

because I was right and you were wrong

sorry ’bout that, you said

next day you hiccuped

and I relented

now I’ll leave, and every time I hiccup

I’ll think of you

and your receding hairline

and how you offered me kosher crackers

one time.