Mrs. Pennington, J.D. Parks Elementary School
She’s archetype woman,
terrorizing third graders
who hate homework,
multiplication tables,
her disappointed frowns.
Righteous- that’s the word
she most represents, teaching
is her call, her moral obligation,
to win her smile is to win.
Simple, she means well,
but isn’t very smart.
In 1959, she didn’t need to be,
her world was small,
there was a place for everything.
The race for the moon
was way above her head.
Albert
I wasn’t always this old man in a chair
knocking over his iced tea at every meal,
even simple choices taken away, you decide
what fork full to try to push past my lips.
I can’t even kiss you, Clara, though you
brush your cheek to mine, telling me
everything’s just fine when I cry or drool,
shit myself in payment for devotion.
You should leave me out some night,
pray some wild dog drags me off,
find a new husband to make you smile,
a man whose tongue knows what to do.
In dreams I talk endlessly: politics,
grandchildren, the weather; I’m not mad
when I’m asleep, I don’t even hate God,
or the cane or this contraption I sit in.
Let me go, let me stop wishing for more,
I want to walk with the dogs, drive away,
feel the heft of a shotgun in my hands,
stare at the sun with nothing left to see.
Fannie
She’s had it with those skinny women
on morning TV, tables heavy laden
with products she can’t afford, enticed
by beauty, youth, and sexual promise.
Each day she weighs, the agony of truth.
When low she celebrates the loss, if up
she chews and cries. Form follows deed,
she waddles under considerable pressure.
Sometimes hunger is simply hunger,
more likely it’s a lack of stimulation,
a reaction to a friend who wants to please,
a full cup remedy for her empty heart.
Not like a bottle she can refuse to buy,
a cigarette crushed and tossed, she has to
eat to live, no substitute, no pill, no shake
magic- she’s tried and failed every one.
In restaurants she endures tight-lipped stares
no matter what she orders, it’s not the meal,
it’s the simple fact she boldly goes there,
dares to parade her lazy ways, her lack.
Faced with the television rattle of naked bones,
the later burger push, the midnight pizza drone,
to eat or not to eat is moot, at home in peace, she
forgives herself, repeatedly, for each leftover bite.
This is not the first time
since she left them there
bungling into a different life
her name is spoken in passing
and like a spilled tin of buttons
incidents roll in every direction:
how she caused her dads death,
broke her mothers spirit, forgot
where she came from, denied
complicity, the smallest mote
to bear affinity for what is taken,
for all she chooses to leave behind.
Buttons under the dresser, the rug,
swept off by strangers, connections
never completed, garments rent.
How is it that sharp edges become soft curves?
In my memory it was all gray, no blue at all,
it was me and you at Phil’s or Joe’s Inn.
Franklin Street now has more ghosts than folks
I knew back when Eddie Weaver flourished
and Joe Kennedy was more than all that jazz.
Fiddle-dee-dee, Scarlett! Some people
dressed all out when the Westhampton
showed your movie again, Georgia Girl!
Did you think I’d forgotten you, sweetie?
Nobody forgets in Richmond, no way,
every place has a story, or two or ten.
Come back again and slip in beside me,
we’ll park by where the Clover Room
used to be and eat Krispy Kreme till we cry.
1.
The glow of the television wakes me to words dancing on my skin. It is the dream of your last letter. The first page is meant only for my eyes to weep over and they do though the ink does not run. The second page is in blue, green, and finally, red pen though not addressed to me but the others. Ruth who is not your mother followed by a brief close to me in black, of course it would be. I have wet myself from grief and hurry to remove the green quilt before anyone can see what I have done for you.
2.
Pain is not an absolute but a river of many depths and temperatures. It will smooth rocks and reroute memory. There is anger at its beginning that must travel many miles before it can be calmed. Sadness is the current that flows beneath beautiful landscapes it will never recognize. When I try to whisper your name I shiver and cannot speak.
3.
My burdens are intolerable, I am disfigured by all that has gone before. Another dreamer takes me away to familiar landscapes but your ghost is my shadow.
4.
Silence has broken and I am deaf. Each breath is an expiration, every beat pushes blood to extremities. The arms of your words will not release me or I cling to them.
