Married...with Children, Revisited

Graffiti tags in a litany of 1-2-3 liners, the banana peel under the heel of Job,

the face a menace of cheeks, Dangerfield squints, chewing teeth, shades of balding,

the Americana tie and rolled up sleeves, newspaper under the arms after the flush,

the same episodic joke of a man over and over, in the wit of his vulgar domesticity,

the never-win, but works out, the cry of food, shelter, and pawned playboys,

and the fat woman sings her shoe is a different size, Al Bundy,

this Al Bundy, this watcher of crap on TV, hand in pants,

this Al Bundy, this high school dream footballer, with 3 touchdowns in one game,

Al Bundy, the lover, the weeper, the mourner, the victorious,

this Al Bundy standing at the barbeque with mittens and chef hat,

this Al Bundy, who helpless in the faces of those around, digs sanity

as family, friends, neighbors, professionals, dignitaries, scoff at him,

this Al Bundy comes home and asks the old world for dinner, pauses, is not surprised

when it isn’t served, every third minute the show arrives.

And when ex-homecoming queen Peg, pink bowling tights, 50s hyperbolic red hair,

sits at home, always a cig, always a bon-bon, always a mockery of herself

and the feminist revolution she spins, never cooking an egg, never doing what women once

were supposed to do, pleasantly rubs the Panamanian statue for lottery winnings,

Peg, the receptive to the atomic heat,

Peg, the experienced wife, with a retort for a depraved world,

Peg, the committed to the pathetic man, committed with cartoonish smiles,

and rolling nods, and sideway glances,

Peg, the life of once or twice a week, implied by the minute hand on a clock,

Peg, the screeching shrew meant for Al, a trashy pair they make of the TV screen,

with an invisible wink that reveals the ruse for the score of their marriage,

a caricature relationship of happy-go-lucky desperation, way past the hill

and into the cities of holy masquerade,

the tragicomedy of the blind king and blind queen,

and the side you are on is never dull as the same joke unfolds.

Enter the exhibition are the children: Kelly and Bud, iconic, frivolous, reflecting

a generation just learning to forget to read, learning to use remotes,

Kelly, dear cat of ditz, the lust of popularity and the slut of the populace,

Pumpkin, who doesn’t know when the jokes on her,

yet wields the baton at patriarch and matriarch, can’t spell “A,”

but consistent to full capacity of her prowling charms,

this Kelly, the accidental instigator solving minor problems, with air-head precision,

this Kelly, 90s dressed rockstar living in the 80s, blondeness wakes

as she places her hand to her head to worry,

Kelly, dear lover of the random ooze and meat, dregs and misfits

out of the carnival image of punk and metal scenes,

dear Kelly, daughter swinging in the web of nobody caring,

and reactive without cares in the world,

and older sibling in the rivalry of who is played more,

Bud, Bud, backseat smart, suave pervert,

twirp with no compunction, piping in truth here and there,

the son of no identity but the father of his own hand,

here Bud is drilling a hole to peep,

there Bud is pickpocketing the bully,

here Bud is selling Al to the neighborhood children,

there Bud is punching line after line into the skull of the dim,

the schemer Bud, the butt of his pubescent id,

the clown Bud, Al’s Dodge dressed in brand new clothes each year,

Bud, Bud, one bus ticket away from strip club promoter,

an amateur at everything he does, Bud the pro dog for one dollar,

and cuing needed segments and guts comes the dog, Buck,

a moral code underlying, to revolt his master, the Bundys,

as if to know their rootless, fruitless starvation

is of their own device, and Buck won’t be part of it, this Buck,

this dog that reverses Lassie’s trust and loyalty,

Buck Bundy witnesses where dogs dare,

Buck Bundy, trained to be untrained, always exiting stage left.

And under the Sisyphean merry-go-round that is Married…with Children,

where sweat stains in V-necks and power flushing toilets

and ovulations are puppet strings,

under all the why-me, and God-why, and who-cares,

a No-Exit sign is in the real laughter, as each cast member pauses.