Three Women in a Small Town

[Exit]

This isn't done, but I wanted feedback before I do anything else with it. These three characters are interconnected and it might be part of a larger story if I keep messing around with it. I have ideas for things I might want to change, but I love other people's opinions, too.

Viola Martin
Viola Martin rolled into town
Dusty road and Studebaker gown 
Wavy blonde hair with smooth cloche hat:
What did the town think about that?

Gas station husband pumps off the porch 
Neighbor widow is hot for the church
Viola smooths on red lipstick
Venetian blinds close with a click

Elsie Brown

Blinds flutter shut, eyelashes cast down
Her rosy cheeks flushed, heart takes a bound
Gas station wife, Elsie so plain
Dishwater life, John’s ball and chain 

Little sparrow flits, smooths her brown hair
Fast smacks the arrow seeing the pair 
John pumping gas his jaw hangs slack
Viola’s red lips looking back

Elsie Brown’s kitchen, antique green walls
Spotless today, but Elsie recalls
a crystal gazer said she’d seen
wet poppies on a field of green.

Rachel Miller

Rachel Miller is straight as a board
Raises an eyebrow, praises the lord
Swears she can smell that red lipstick
smeared on creamy and way too thick

She sits in the pew Sundays at eight
Stained glass picture of the pearly gate
The early sun rays warm her hands
Crimson stains where justice will land

Sin gets washed the blood of the lamb
Souls come dirty to the Great I Am
They will be cleansed white from the flow
The rent to the mend so Rachel goes

I think using couplets or quatrains is fine (On Paradise Lost, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, anything by Wordsworth, Blake—the list goes on of epic simple-rhyming narrative poems). And I like it here, it works. Or at least it would work but unfortunately—like I think I have mentioned before on another one of your poems—the meter is letting you down. The rhymes are (mostly) working but I'm struggling with the rhythm. Maybe read it out loud and, tedious as it is, count syllables. You're even forcing rhymes like "the early sun rays warm her hands / crimson stains where justice WILL land" but there seems no reason to force "will" (in this instance) because nothing else fits. If you wanted to hit the rhyme and rhythm why not "the sun's early rays warm her hands / crimson stains where justice lands"? And I'm not sure that would even work in the context of the whole poem because there is no baseline meter. 

Having said all that, I liked reading it and there is definitely something here to cultivate. But, if you are going to improve it it's up to you to get into the boring work of actually counting syllables and finding ways to not force rhymes. Also, this is all premised on the idea that you want to make it tighter. Most poetry will sacrifice a certain amount of rhythm for meaningful rhyme (or rhyme for meaningful rhythm) it just strikes me that you are aiming for both and only failing on the rhythm part.