Red Convertible

Suzanne Morris

June 30, 2024

Two men came to deliver a new

side-by-side washer and dryer set

in high-gloss white

and haul away the high-end

pair in candied-apple red 

that had commanded

our washroom

for nearly two decades.

I remarked to one–a Black man

with a bushy gray beard

and a little space between

his two front teeth– 

how you had joked when we

selected the color,

that we were too old for a

red convertible

so we were buying a red

washer and dryer instead.

The man’s face broke into

a broad boyish grin.

You’re never too old

for a red Corvette, he said.

Funny he would readily

think of

that sexy, low-slung

powerhouse of a car

you had fantasized about owning

from the time you were a teenager

until you were way too old to

ease in behind the wheel.

And as though it were yesterday

I could hear you express the hope

that the pricey washer and dryer

would last the rest of our lives.

In your case, though not by far,

they had.

I watched as the pair

in candied-apple red

were hoisted up, then

bumped and shoved, side by side

till they were swallowed up

in the mouth of the delivery truck,

the accordion door 

rolling down and banging shut

then the truck was

speeding away.

A native of Houston, Suzanne Morris has made her home in East Texas for nearly two decades.  Her poems have appeared in anthologies as well as online poetry journals, including The Texas Poetry Assignment, The New Verse News, The Pine Cone Review, and Stone Poetry Quarterly.