Zachary McLeod Hutchins

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BEDTIME TRIO

Childhood (7PM)

Your parents tuck you into bed,
But they can’t make you go to sleep.
You rise: “The sun’s still overhead.”
Your parents tuck you back in bed.
You hold your breath until you’re red
And weep. They say, “Try counting sheep,”
And grimly tuck you back in bed.
(But they can’t make you go to sleep!)

Fatherhood (8PM)

You tuck your children back in bed.
You’re sweaty, desperate to get off
That tie. Their shrieks would wake the dead;
You tuck your children back in bed.
The thought of sex flits through your head.
The tie comes off; she hears a cough.
You tuck your children back in bed.
You’re sweaty, desperate to get off.

Motherhood (9PM)

You tuck your children back in bed.
You’re desperate to escape their touch,
But two cry out, with arms outspread—
You tuck your children back in bed.
Now Dick is touching you instead.
Another cries; it’s all too much.
You tuck your children back in bed.
Dick’s sleeping; you escape his touch.

Zachary McLeod Hutchins is a Professor of English at Colorado State University. His most recent book is Joseph: An Epic, from the University of Illinois Press. The author of peripatetic verse, he writes from the streets and trails of Fort Collins, where he lives with his wife, Alana, and eight children.