Poetry International Poetry International
Poem

Jennifer Maiden

The Audience

The Audience

The Audience

Eleanor Roosevelt woke up next to Dietrich
Bonhoeffer and realized that this was
not Chelsea’s wedding. It seemed to her
she had dozed off there but plainly here
was a different meeting. Hillary was suited
in black and white and cheerfully flirted
with Kevin Rudd, who flirted back
on the podium like a schoolboy with his
mouth full of cheap candy. She prayed
he wouldn’t actually roll his eyes.  Dietrich
smiled more benignly in his place, no doubt
having waited for Kevin of old, like this
and been consoled, even in 2010
New York and such hilarity of waste.
Close

The Audience

Eleanor Roosevelt woke up next to Dietrich
Bonhoeffer and realized that this was
not Chelsea’s wedding. It seemed to her
she had dozed off there but plainly here
was a different meeting. Hillary was suited
in black and white and cheerfully flirted
with Kevin Rudd, who flirted back
on the podium like a schoolboy with his
mouth full of cheap candy. She prayed
he wouldn’t actually roll his eyes.  Dietrich
smiled more benignly in his place, no doubt
having waited for Kevin of old, like this
and been consoled, even in 2010
New York and such hilarity of waste.

The Audience

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