4:30 Movie

The smells of pot roast
Homemade spaghetti sauce
And roasted chicken
Filled the house
To the sounds of metal pots
And pans being banged around
In the kitchen
As I tried to get a week’s worth in of
‘Planet Of The Apes’
‘Our Man Flint’
Or
Ray Harryhausen.

Channel 7
UHF

New York’s ABC affiliate
Was the only competiition
To stray me from
After school free time
To be out in the woods
Building forts
Chasing deer
Finding salamanders and snakes
Lighting fires
And smoking cigarettes.

If I wasn’t outside
Playing
‘War’

It was because
I was watching
‘Pirate Week’
‘Monster Week’
‘Vincent Price Week’
‘Jungle Week’.

The 4:30 Movie
Was famous for
Showing whole weeks of stuff.

Jerry Lewis
Raquel Welch
Elvis...

And then they had theme weeks...
‘Fantasy’
‘Western’
‘Strange Worlds’
‘Laugh-A-Thon’
‘Adventure’
‘Suspense’.

‘Bad Girls Week”
“Beach Party Week”
“Edgar Allan Poe Week”.

There was something
Secure
And comforting
To feel the thrill and suspense
Of a good
B-Movie
Psychotic thriller
Or to laugh my ass off
During
“It’s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World”

Only to have my
Nurturing
Loving mom
Call me in to
Have a well-made supper.

There was no arguing
That
I was going to miss
The last fifteen
Minutes
Of
The 4:30 Movie.

For awhile
I didn’t know
How the
Japanese monsters
Died
If they did at all.

Or if
The Martians
Conquered the Humans.

It was some time
Before
I found out
How the West was won.