Two Housewives (Age 2)

To break the monotony of their day,
     my mother, and her best friend,
     ate breakfast at the dinette within Schnucks,
     before they did their grocery shopping for the week.

At age two, I was the last remaining child at home,
     and my mom dragged me along.
     She placed me in a highchair,
     and pushed M & Ms into my mouth,
     to pacify my potential cries.

Mom and Sue drank their coffee,
     and gossiped about neighbors,
     complained about husbands,
     laughed about kids,
     and commiserated in their shared exhaustion. 

Both held college degrees,
     but here they sat,
     and shopped,
     and lamented about lives that might have been.
    
Two women sat,
     trapped in the cultural norms,
     that imprisoned them in homes--
     tethered to irons,
     soaked in raw beef,
     smothered by loads of laundry,
     glued to brooms,
         sweeping away the dirt.
         And wishing they, too, could be swept away
                 to a different kind of life.