Three Poems, by Danny Caine

IT’S A HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS CHRISTMAS

Tell whoever says there’s nothing
to do in Fremont, Indiana that
the Holiday Inn Express has
free cookies all night and
a business center and a Christmas tree
all in a row in the lobby. I don’t
remember what we were looking
at on the PC stuck in New Year’s
Day snow between Chicago
and Cleveland but that’s when
we decided to get married
next New Year’s Eve. We
would’ve been swimming
but neither of us ever remembers
to bring a suit. In a different
poem maybe we’d just swim in
our underwear like Bobby did
that one time but I’m not Bobby
and I never will be. A lobby, 
a tree, and Vince Guaraldi
are all we need for something
to do between now and the time
we’ll collapse into stiff sheets,
lumpy pillows, each other. 

IT’S A CRACKER BARREL CHRISTMAS

 Try enter through the gift shop
passing four themed trees before
you get to the kids who take
your name. According to their
aprons they are rising stars. 
The roving employees, fully
risen, have baskets and
I don’t know why. One of the
Santa Ornaments might be
black but he could also be tan.
On the fourth day of Christmas, 
Cracker Barrel gave to me
a measuring spoon set, each
shaped like a pine, each labeled:
¼ tsp of LOVE. ½ tsp of PEACE. 
1 tsp of JOY, 1 tbsp of BELIEVE
because that much of anything
needs to be a verb. Believe it
when I tell you Ray and Wilma
Yoder just finished their quest
to visit every Cracker Barrel
in America. I used to want
to go to every ballpark but
now Ray and Wilma gave me
another idea. We would like
to welcome DANNY PARTY
OF TWO to Cracker Barrel:
your table is ready!  I used to
hate that my parents went to
Applebee’s and Target on
Friday nights, now here I am
at Cracker Barrel on the way
to Ikea. At what point do these
places stop being ironic things
to write about and just become
what I like? Cracker Barrel
courtesy announcement for
DANNY PARTY OF ONE:
that point is already
Christmas passed. 

IT’S A WAFFLE HOUSE CHRISTMAS

The hotel closest to Grandma’s
closest to affordable doesn’t have
breakfast but it does share
a parking lot with a Waffle House
so Christmas morning over
the curbs and through the
gas station hedge to Waffle’s
House we go. As soon as
the door chimes we feel it—
Tiny Tim doesn’t show us
to our table but he might
as well. All the seats are full
except for ours and the waitress
is in a good mood. The line cook
isn’t on a 45-minute smoke break
and all our food comes hot
and at once and people are
laughing and cheerful but
they’re not singing or anything
thank god
and the whole place feels—
what’s the word—clean? 
It’s a Christmas miracle, 
a Waffle House that looks
like what Waffle House
looks like in your sepia
memories. It’s enough
to make me want to stand
on a table, spread my arms
and yell

God bless us, 
every scattered
smothered and
covered one of us.

Danny Caine is author of the CONTINENTAL BREAKFAST (Mason Jar Press, 2019) and the chapbook Uncle Harold's Maxwell House Haggadah (Etchings Press 2017). His work has appeared in DIAGRAM, Mid-American Review, Atticus Review, New Ohio Review, Hobart, and other places. He lives in Lawrence, Kansas, where he owns The Raven Bookstore. More at dannycaine.com.