Afternoon With My Aunt
You came into her house through the kitchen.
The big door in from the front porch
Hadn't been used for years;
Furniture stood hard against it.
A knock at the front door meant a stranger.
Aunt Celesta makes a tall pitcher
Of green Kool-Aid and ice cubes.
She fills two glasses and we sit
Together at the kitchen table.
I have so much to say!
I have to tell her everything that's happened
Since I saw her last.
The sun shines in through white curtains,
The window full of little plants that are violets.
You have to go out the back door for the toilet,
Down some steps and a little path.
She takes my hand to go down the steps.
I remember my arm stretched tight
Above my head to her strong hand.
She lifts me at every step.
I am light like a monkey!
Cissa helps take down my pants
And lifts me onto my place on the bench.
She pulls up her own dress. We sit.
We look through the pictures in the Sears catalog.
She tears us out some tissue pages.
Aunt Cissa got her dresses from the catalogs
Or made them herself, Mama said,
Because she was big.
It was because she was big in the olden days
That Uncle Ralph made her meet him
Inside the picture show. That way
No one would see. He told her
The seat number and everything
So he wouldn't be embarrassed.
Uncle Ralph thinks he is handsome.
When they are headed into town,
She has to wait in the car
While he goes back in to fix his hair
And put on his gray-blue felt hat
That matches his eyes.
Auint Cissa told us. She and Mama laughed.
We go into the special room that is just her own.
The heavy wood door is closed.
Inside is a fairyland, a big bed with white pillows
And a white ceiling to it with ruffles.
A pair of lady's gloves with shiny beads lies
There on the white quilt cover,
A tiny beaded purse with a gold handle.
The pictures on the walls are
Of soft-colored dogs and kittens
And one of an old-fashioned lady
Like a shadow against silky white milkweed.
We have one like that at home;
Aunt Celesta and Mama gathered the milkweed
And cut out the ladies from black paper
When they were girls one time.
They tell me "silhouette."
I rest my head on Aunt Cissa.
It feels like I am folded up inside her softness.
The rocking chair goes easy back and forth.
I must have fell asleep because
I didn't hear the car come in.
Here is Mama in her feather hat
And high heel shoes! I get down unsteady,
Cissa's print still on my side.
It feels cold where she used to be.
I am a yellow balloon
I drift around tall rooms
Trailing a string behind me
Eyes just above the table top
Ears. No mouth.
I wear her ring.
Copyright © Elizabeth Mccann | Year Posted 2022
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