pulling her cinnamon stocking to
her knees
mother decides she must talk
right
“want to stop saying ‘ain’t’ and ‘I done,’
like I just got off the boat”
mother has never been on a boat
but years ago dozens of her
came by Greyhound
in the their southern tongues
that held their dreams
singing…“we north now”
pulling the rolls from the oven
mother decides she must talk
right
“Ain’t…aren’t they delicious?”
her words
spiced with ain’t gots and she be’s and
he be’s
now coming clean
it hurts to hear her effort
to hear this new mouth
the sum of all her dreams
the ones with Lysol and spatulas
measuring cups and KitchenAids
patios and dinner parties and
grass green enough to
vomit on
polishing the china, staring
out the window
mother decides she must talk
right
her voice
once like cornbread
buttery, full of heat
now stale
and she,
dead to her southern self
lost in a mean and
unreachable
dream
Reprinted from the Wabash Review
