Saturday Matinee

after Study for Going to the Pictures 1941 by Russell Drysdale

Preview

It’s Saturday again. The tall man and the child in short pants

walk hand in hand. They are going to the movie matinee.

National Anthem

The tall man sings with gusto God save the King

the king who is monarch of their town and the boy has heard men say

they will die for king and country. The boy in short pants wonders

would the king wear a golden, jeweled crown

would the king die for the tall man, for red dust and flies

The Newsreel

War in black and white, explosions, boom and bang

ships-sink-buildings-burn-soldiers-run-with-rifles-dodge-bullets

and words the boy’s ears like: luftwaffe, blitz, determination, stiff upper lip

The Feature Film

Set in a small town but not the town of the boy in short pants

another child, another family, another time and a green valley

that wasn’t green and scarecrow men blackened with coal

who rise up from tunnels in the earth, melt into the doors of houses

each one grey like the next as smoke struggles from the rows of chimneys

Interval

In the foyer the tall man and the boy in short pants share a treat

a little bucket of ice cream with a flat wooden spoon

and when the bell rings calling them for the second half, the boy asks

can we go outside. I don’t like the dark. And the tall man

his gusto gone, says yes, let’s go out into the light and feel the sun

The End