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Write On Magazine's Featured
Poet
Nancy Sherrod
Nancy Sherrod
Poet
from Statesboro, Georgia
Baby Picture
by Nancy Sherrod
I am the one on the left,
the barefoot girl wearing a yellow dress
with crinolines. I was born
in that dress, shiny black shoes on my feet.
The socks were white with lace.
I would believe no common tales
of being born butt-naked into the world.
Child size chairs like the one my brother took
appeared magically in places like church,
the doctor's office, my aunt's house in Florida.
Marianna, Bristol, Blountstown--
we made our rounds--the poor relatives.
"Here take this," the woman would whisper,
pressing into my mother's hands money,
while Daddy would look away.
The silver-grained photograph shows
my brother's head's head huge--the water brain
who took my chair. He looks down and to the right,
as I do, my brows curled into a fierce knot.
I wanted that red chair with the peeling white arms
more than the yellow dress grown too small,
scratching my neck now or the crinolines too high
to scratch anything on the shiny black shoes
biscuit-polished for church, abandoned
for a warm day or maybe just the feel
of grass tickling my flat feet--
unfortunate miniatures of my mother.
No, I will not smile for the camera,
but here is my elbow. Give it your best shot,
and I'll give you mine. Yes,
the top of my straw yellow head
makes a good picture--
from where you stand.
© 1997 copyright
Nancy Sherrod
I come back
by Nancy Sherrod
to look for my golden arm
like the woman in a ghost tale
who cannot rest until she finds
her missing part.
Petals from the pear tree stretch
from here to the diminishing square
where the house once stood.
My sister's hands transplanted
dogwoods from near the swamp
where wild azaleas--pink, delicate
as the cheeks of children--gather in
the newly green world of spring.
The impatiens come back, the ones
that bloom with no one's help.
Upcreek, our muddy swimming hole has grown
into a respectable pond. It's theirs--
the young couple's--title and deed.
They moved the house to higher ground,
sheetrocked the walls, left the pine floors bare,
the boards worn smooth--what we had--
fashionable now.
I come back to find
my golden arm, not golden
but flesh and blood, firmly attached,
here, wherever I am,
not there.
© 1997 copyright
Nancy Sherrod
Come Fall,
by Nancy Sherrod
the lowliest things look beautiful
to my eyes--flea bane, golden rods,
joe pye weeds--along the road
that leads home to Mama.
Mama, I have replaced you
a thousand times over, and still
I am pulled back, back
down this road. My car glides through
sand its tires can barely grip.
I am careful now not to be pulled
down into the crooked, low ditch.
I've learned the penalty for venturing
too close to the edge. Beyond the ditch,
just before solid earth gives way
to swamp, a patch of purple loosestrife
blooms, mad to speak, wildly beautiful
in a world turned hot and dry.
Come Fall, I am filled
with strange yearnings
and do not sleep well at night.
© 1997 copyright
Nancy Sherrod
Red Shoes
by Nancy Sherrod
I was almost killed by joy
once. I put on the red shoes
and tapped over the edge,
fell in love with the free fall,
not even knowing when I had crashed,
but my broken bones knew I would not
knit back together anytime soon
and the sinews would not hold
though I wrapped them tight
around my bruised flesh.
I ran more hobbling than was meet
in clumsy thick soles not my own.
I did this for two years,
and in the third year, I cast off
the dull shoes, complaining of poor fit,
and walked barefoot for miles and miles.
Because I am in this story
and can't find my way back
to a time before the red shoes
called my name, I bolt my doors
and shut the windows tight
before I reach high into my closet
where the red shoes are kept.
I put them on and watch my feet
twitch with the promise
to someday dance again,
refusing to believe
a little joy will kill me.
© 1997 copyright
Nancy Sherrod
Psychic Soup
by Nancy Sherrod
After months of famine, love is served
to me, a bowl of psychic soup--hot, salty, sour,
filled with sweet morsels I would die for.
Hurry, ladle up another bowl. The first
I ate too quickly, the second left me hungry
again in two hours, the third left me crying--
sweet, sweet, sweet. For you, would swim
oceans of sale, scald my tongue, suffer
heartburn for hours. Another bowl, please.
Everything else vanishes on my tongue--
God, sky, trees, words on the page--
meringue, puffs of sweet air.
© 1997 copyright
Nancy Sherrod
Write On Magazine's Featured
Poet
Nancy Sherrod
Nancy Sherrod Poet from Statesboro, Georgia
by Nancy Sherrod |
