A Poem

Delta Images: Memorial Weekend 2010

Breakfast at McDonald’s with multi-colored, silk flowers on every table,
The scent of coffee and bacon encircling the convivial crowd.

An endlessly rowed plantation of cotton plants,
Two black men sharpening their hoes, with cigarettes dangling,
Their PT Cruiser with its eyes facing us.

The ancient bridge as we cross the Mississippi River in brightening sun,
The modern steel-cabled bridge parallel to it--empty, and yet to be
Crossed.

The showboat welcoming center with its paddle wheel and tiny museum.
Displays of Mississippi--high and low, present and past:
Jim Henson and Kermit, the flood of 1927, a bale of snowy cotton, and a figure of a blues musician, clad in orange and aqua, with an
Ever-present guitar beside him.

The scent of BBQ and magnolias in Greenville as dark, delta images
Of childhood memories flood over me instead of the levee.
The picture of an ancient me now on top of the grass and concrete,
A casino in the background, a brown muddy river flowing behind,
The sight of a ten-year-old in my mind, swimming
In the river from a sandbar with sister and friends.
Did we have any idea of the undertow in our lives to come?

A search soon for the burial ground of loved ones gone in Greenwood.
The noontime growl of my stomach as we pass a diner on the right,
Filled to capacity at tables and at the lunch counter,
All blacks in the glass-windowed place.

The Crystal Grill for us with its newly-added talipia to its menu,
Not the traditional catfish only. Lemon and tartar
Sauce added for delicacy,
the patronage--as always-- in this window-less restaurant fully white,
Have fifty years of absence not seen more changes?

The solitude of Odd Fellows cemetery as I place pale pink mums
Upon my grandmother’s grave, she who said she would
Haunt me if I did not take care of her final resting place.
Though not haunted verbally any more by my drunken father,
I forgive him for wrongs past and thank my step-grandfather
For loving me.

The bustling city-town of Oxford on a humid, summer-like day,
The ever-standing Confederate soldier ever guarding the square,
Square Books with its several children—discount books and
Children’s books now in separate stores, signed copies of
Great Mississippi authors—Barry Hannah, Larry Brown,
Willie Brown in abundance along with newer greats—
Richard Ford, Lewis Nordan, and others.
The mustiness of the old building paired with the scent of lattes,
Cappuccinos, and cookies upstairs.
I touch the books with a reverence.

The final stop: a multi-acre farm in Crowder owned by my
Best friend from high school’s family,
The search through the yearbook of 1962 and the recitation
By her of the fate of each of the fifty members of our class:
The deaths, the marriages, the children, and the unrecognized surprise—
Most still live in North Mississippi after all these
Millennia’s.

The cumulus cloud shaped like a sculptor of the thinker,
Backlighting provided by an exhausted sun.
The full moon with its man staring at us as we go west
Into the darkening night.