Nancy Scott

THE PORK PIE, THE CANDY BAR, AND THE GLASS OF COLD MILK (OR LETTER FROM GLOUCESTER COUNTY JAIL)

Why I ended up in jail is no mystery. After months of listening to those more glib than I at making predictions, I began plotting my future. However when asked if I preferred the pork pie, the candy bar, or the glass of cold milk, I was flummoxed.

As spring finished and summer wore on, mine became a solitary quest. Nothing was the same—the milk curdled, the pork pie went rancid, and the candy bar disappeared—I blame myself for not being vigilant. Frustrated, I took a gun and started shooting at random, hitting a man with a briefcase in the leg.

Despite predictions to the contrary, the house suddenly went up in flames and everything perished. With the fate of the stolen candy unknown, no option remained. I had fired a gun based on a faulty premise. The man I shot understood and didn’t press charges. I thought that was the end of it.

The prosecutor, an elected official, thought differently. I was convicted, not for the shooting, but for failing to make the proper choice. I might have bluffed my way out of all this had the cops apprehended the candy thief in a timely way. After a lengthy interrogation, she admitted to eating the chocolate and got a $5 fine.


Nancy reads "The Pork Pie, the Candy Bar, and the Glass of Cold Milk..."



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Nancy confesses: "The spectacle of the primaries became a daily fix—lying, stupidity, meanness, shouting, narcissism fueled my indecision about whom to vote for, but in a country where we have had to fight and sometimes die for the right to vote, not voting feels like a crime. Satire seemed one way to deal with what was going on."

NANCY SCOTT, the managing editor of U.S.1 Worksheets, is the author of nine books of poetry. Her most recent, Ah, Men (Aldrich Press, 2016) is a retrospective of the men in her life. Her poetry and short fiction have appeared in more than 100 different journals as well as numerous times on this site. She is also an artist, exhibiting her collages and mixed media in juried shows throughout New Jersey and Pennsylvania. www.nancyscott.net.