Reid Baer
Excerpt from KotaPress Poetry Anthology Volume 3, 2003

Lunchtime Legacy

Our Father prepares school time lunches
a month in advance assembly line style
three halves of a sandwich in a plastic sack
for three children some meat and some cheese
and peanut butter from a North Pole deep freeze

until the morning sun shines and the day thaws hunger
without milk money
glad for a bonus apple
added to the nourishment sufficient for our needs
stuffed in a brown paper bag as you please

we bite into the freezer burned bread in shame
watching on as other parents children lovingly
sate on freshly buttered rolls carrot sticks
individually packaged chips and Twinkies
in a Roy Rogers lunch box without apologies

Author Bio
Reid Baer has worked for a number of years as a newspaper reporter (covering the crime beat) in Rockingham County, North Carolina. He has recently finished his first novel, “Kill The Story.” Baer is an accomplished award-winning playwright with productions in New York, Utah, Illinois and California. He has only recently jumped into the world of poetry, with a handful of poems to his publishing credit. The author is a classically-trained pianist.