Davis DuBose-Marler

Family Dinner

There was something in his eyes tonight
they say, as if the wine wasn’t the culprit.
 
Papa was drunk, his laughter and tears caught,
choking in the fold of a borrowed napkin.
 
Is this contentment
When he yells again and again of his daughter’s charms?
 
Let’s toast again, to thirty year anniversaries,
to matches on Tinder and films without funds.
 
The glasses crash,
and champagne bubbles back to life.
 
Everything’s funny now, but she’s not smiling.
He puts his arm around her and sighs.
We’re lucky, we’re lucky.