Release the Karen

My retail tours came during peacetime.
Tickle Me Elmo armies a small fraction
of the toilet paper marauders of today.

And we had them, as you have them
The customer as plight:
Demanding every discount
No matter how expired
Or imaginary.
Hunting every bargain, or the managers head.
Our “soccer mom”, your “Karen”.

But Christmas eve, 97
he floated to the register
on a juniper cloud,
one hour before closing,
his whole holiday
cocked into one cart,
and unloaded a full magazine of credit cards.

The kickback of each decline
Reverberated in the vein on his neck.
His bellicose report that I explain
to his kids how somehow
I, ruined their Christmas.

As the gin vapor trailed off like gun smoke,
He demanded his rightful place in this trial,
he was a lawyer, after all.

The credit card machine, unimpressed,
repeated its one-word judgement
Until he finally stormed off empty handed,
visions of firing me dancing in his head,
his red nose hopefully not
guiding his sleigh into oncoming traffic.

Was he Soccer Mom? Is he Karen?
Or just blowing off steam after a rough week?
Hardwired to be demanding in a stressful world.
You know how some guys get.

At least he picked my register,
light on adult responsibility,
fresh out of yuletide fucks to give.
He could just as easily have picked Cheryl,
running on the fumes of holiday cheer.
This job barely putting food
in her young daughter’s mouth.

With no money to spend on Christmas,
and even less time,
her seasonal smile was slowly untying.
If it slips off for a moment in the grocery store,
or at the gas station,
is she Karen?

Don’t get me wrong, I saw plenty of women
Living their best life in the stereotype,
The histrionic angles that just might work
If their voice projected loudly enough from the diaphragm
“I talked to Mike on the phone and he said you could do it”
in that impersonating an officer tone,
not bothering to read my nametag.

The Karen’s are real, some of them,
but they are by no means alone.
It’s funny how even in our morality plays
this wide array of characters
coalesces into one body, one name, one “Karen”,
never “Jackson” or “Liam”.

The most entitled of all
still glide aerodynamically over
all accountability,
redeeming double miles along the way,
Their self-importance pure, unmasked.

Anyone else caught abusing the help
is dragged out before the court,
That right is theirs alone, after all.

From the collection Carry-out Carton Fortress

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