Poetry Pause is the League of Canadian Poets’ daily poetry dispatch. Read “Radio Bingo” from Maggie Burton’s collection Chores, shortlisted for the League’s Gerald Lampert Memorial Award.

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Radio Bingo

by Maggie Burton

I sprawl on Nan’s bed, paint

my nails red, listen to VOWR’s

Hymns for the Quiet Hour, the greatest

opera of our time, a weekly

tragedia lirica where no one gets out

alive. I am the wardrobe supervisor.

The star I dress in slack-pants, blouse,

pastel cardigan, compression socks,

perm, knitted slippers, a billowy,

high-waisted dress. I put on her rings,

squish the spider veins attempting to nest

in soft skin. She changes the station

to the Voice of the Common Man

as the top of the hour news,

the overture, begins. Nan straightens

her wig, enters stage left.

Don Giovanni hides in the living

room corner, double-timing

whiskey and homebrew while Donna

Elvira flies around the stage:

“who will ever tell me where

that scoundrel is? Ah! Chi mi dice mai,

I will rip his heart out.” She takes

her seat at the kitchen table, stabs

the free spaces with her dabber.

Heavy with gossip, full of fresh smoke

from Player’s tub rollies, the air

is thick fresh bread. I hold my breath

as the first number is called.

Behind the radio’s tinny mouth,

the announcer is dressed

as Pagliaccio but no one can see

his beautiful face. The sad thought

of him crying into his double-double

kills me. Backstage, Nan does

her warmups, scolds my lazy lack

of makeup, pinching my baby fat,

again. I can bear it no more.

I rise as Norma, proclaim “blood,

blood! Revenge!” on all my relatives.

I chase her from the room,

my fingers down my throat.

The curtains draw. Lace hiding

nothing. Anyone could see us here,

struggling. Dido this time,

Nan laments, “remember me, but ah!

forget my fate,” orders another smoke

be set ablaze, a pyre. I click the lighter.

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Originally from Brigus, Newfoundland and Labrador, Maggie Burton currently lives in St. John’s with her four children where she works as a City Councillor, musician, and writer. Her first book of poetry, Chores, was published by Breakwater Books in 2023. Burton’s poems have been published in Prism, Grain, Riddle Fence, The Malahat Review, and other Canadian journals. She is the recipient of two NL Arts and Letters Awards for poetry.

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