Each Morning I Pray to the Microwave

by Bacopa Literary Review 2019 Poetry contributor Claire Scott Rubin

Years ago I saw a play where a character prayed to a microwave. I thought it was a hilarious spoof on religion. The scene stayed with me, planted the seed of a poem. I wanted to continue with the humor, the over-the-top-ness of it. I played with the idea of a competition between god and a potato:

"I prefer God to a potato most of the time"

A pretty outrageous comparison that I hope makes the reader smile. I thought about the fact that both God and a potato have eyes and felt that would be fun to include.

After the first few lines, the speaker spins out into a tangled personal story of a failed relationship:

"Sara left in a bitter cloud of flying shoes, DVDs & fuck you's"

I wanted to show the speaker's life is chaotic like the lines in the poem, zigzagging from "a failed science experiment" to a cat who "rarely uses its litter box." The speaker is trying to sort through the chaos to find some solid place to stand. The best she can find is the blurry God who may or may not be a potato.

The poem is meant to be humorous, not sacrilegious. I hope that comes across (click on image for larger view):

Claire Scott Rubin, our 2018 Poetry First Prize winner, has received multiple prizes and Pushcart Prize nominations. Her work has been accepted by the Atlanta Review, Bellevue Literary Review, Enizagam, Causeway Lit, New Ohio Review, and Healing Muse, among others. She is the author of Waiting to be Called and Until I Couldn't.