We have 10,000 dads. “You’re so lucky!” say all our friends. “You’re so complicated!” say all our therapists. “Your mom must be so hot!” say all the sleazebags. But sometimes it’s hard. Having 10,000 homes and 10,000 toothbrushes is tricky. The holidays are rough, and remembering every dad’s birthday is impossible. Saying good morning takes all day. Life is a constant fight for attention for the poor dads. They beg and plead with us to have a meal with them or hit around some baseballs. They follow us religiously on Facebook and like all our posts. They have such good hearts, the 10,000 dads. But in the end, how well do we really know any of them?
- Lauren Shapiro
Lauren Shapiro’s first collection of poetry, Easy Math, won the 2011 Kathryn A. Morton Prize, judged by Marie Howe, and was published in 2013 by Sarabande Books. She is also the author of a chapbook, Yo-Yo Logic, published by DIAGRAM/New Michigan Press (2012), and was co-editor of The New Census: An Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry (Rescue Press, 2013). She is an assistant professor of English at Carnegie Mellon University and lives in Edgewood. Many writers featured in Chapter & Verse are guests of Prosody, produced by Jan Beatty. Prosody airs every Saturday morning on WESA 90.5 FM.
