Mrs. Winnie
on the wall a framed pistol
red velvet backing
simple wooden frame
sixty years or more old
old as the vinyl record
or a real rootbeer float
maybe the year of the color tv
I imagine it as a day she
might have been hanging clothes
on an old clothesline in the back
and maybe a neighbor across
the fence, some garden club
lady named Eleanor yells
“Your old man has been shot,”
and I could see how she might have
dutifully been worried but silently
felt relief as she slowly made her
way in the old ’49 Ford driven
by the preacher to the hospital
she finds him alive and learns
that his known mistress finally
had enough and shot him
she regrets to learn that his
“woman disease” hasn’t killed
him yet and she watches him
heal up and dreads his return
many nights she thought maybe
the good lord would relieve her
of the beatings caused by that
moonshine and night prowling
she sits on the porch one quiet
night as the crickets sing and the
lightening bugs decorate the
humid summer night
the radio playing “Some enchanted
evening” and she decides she’ll
at least go after a sentiment
the mistress answers the door
with a cigarette decorated with
stains of her red lips and she
offers her hand in a dainty handshake
once their conversation has ended
she smiles and strolls down the walk
with this pistol in her apron pocket
stained with homemade apple pie filling
and fried chicken grease
she waits until his death to frame it
and now at 91, she smiles still
gazing upon it hanging on her wall
karma has no age and that day
it smiled on Mrs. Winnie
Copyright © Blythe Journey | Year Posted 2010
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