Remnants
Sitting on the front steps of a long porch
In the middle of the deep south
Little Billy looked up at his drunk dad
Hanging on to every word spoken out of his mouth
Leaning into Mama on a church house pew
In the buckle of the Bible belt
Little Hope searched to find the spirit
Everyone said they felt
Laying down atop a backseat of clothes
In the thick of the big city slum
Little Smokey looked for his father
To return from a never ending beer run
Peeking through the hole in the wall
In a place no human should ever live
Little Jezze pushed against contact
With the men who demanded she give
...remnants
Bill gathered himself together
Deciding to see the other side of the world
He vowed to never touch liquor
The day he married "Daddy's Girl"
Hope picked up her religion
And placed it nicely on a shelf
She vowed to never lie
In order to be someone else
Smokey took his opportunity
To leave the slum with pride
He vowed to live out in the open
And never again try to hide
Jezze escaped the world of sin
On a plane headed to the states
She vowed she would never give
To a person she hates
...among the remnants
Funny how circumstances can change
But behaviors bring ya right back
To the place where terror was experienced
In the threads that bind the black
When the weather gets cold
And the heart yearns for the comfort of home
The remnants in the quilt come together
To remind the broken, you are not alone
We try to cut out the dark night
In the sparse light left in the day
Getting so angry with the remnants
For always being in our way
When patterns emerge into images
On the face of Grand-mama's quilt
Let the need for belonging
Shed the unwanted guilt
....of cleaving to the remnants
Written by Trudy Schrader on 07-13-2019
Copyright © Trudy Schrader | Year Posted 2019
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