Texas Politician

Gretchen Johnson 

November 1, 2020

If you can get him drunk enough,

he might admit he’s secretly for gay marriage

and feels awfully bad for those undocumented immigrants

and doesn’t quite comprehend why

science and the bible are meeting more and more in Texas classrooms,

but he says he needs those votes,

needs a way to get out to Austin,

to escape the tiny house of screaming children

and that stain-rimmed sink of never-ending scrubbing,

those bottles and plates and milk-crusted cereal bowls

that his wife’s mind never invented on their wedding day,

standing in a pristine ballroom when life was still tidy

and couch cushions weren’t doorways to a nightmare of filth.

If you can get him drunk enough,

he might admit that even that morning after pill

makes sense for a man like him

whose wife gets nauseous on the pill

and sometimes pulls him closer when he should pull away,

and he finishes too soon,

says he loves those kids but five is enough

and sometimes a few too many,

and if you can get him really drunk,

he may describe those young, thin, hairless bodies

that dance across the screen of that old computer in the garage

while his aging wife sleeps soundly upstairs in an oversized nightshirt,

and he might shout and squeal and call strangers over to recount the night

when he won three grand in a drawn-out battle of Texas Hold’em

with the Baptist pastor and county constable.

He’ll order another one and swear he’d go democrat

for a chance to be a rep in California where they make 90 a year

and are in session year round. He’ll imagine aloud

that ocean of solitary days

only interrupted by a few calls home

to the ragged ones he once thought he wanted,

and he’ll shake your hand hard and beg for that vote

as he slams the last glass down and heads for the door.

Gretchen Johnson is an Assistant Professor at Lamar University. She is the author of three books. Her first two books were published by Lamar University Literary Press. Her novel, Single in Southeast Texas, was published by Golden Antelope Press in 2017 and won the Summerlee Book Prize.