Michael Kalavik | + Follow Poet |
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Should the Levee Ever Break, Act 1, Scene 1, Part 5

Every other Friday afternoon before Bumblebee would leave on her special errand, her mother would open the old cedar trunk at the foot of her bed and give Bumblebee three things to carry with her to Jackson Square. 

The first item Algebra Babineaux hands her daughter is a small, smooth, colorfully painted stone. Bumblebee puts the stone into an envelope and seals it with one of her girlie-girl stickers. She puts the envelope in the pocket inside her cloak. The second item Bumblebee receives from her mother is an old hand mirror. Not the good one with the fancy silver handle that lay on her mother’s vanity, but the other one; the one with the cracked wooden frame. Bumblebee tucks the mirror snugly into her belt. 

Bumblebee’s mother explains that the stone is to protect her from people who are shifty and insincere. She said it had been given to her many years earlier by a Choctaw shaman whose son she’d once tutored. The Choctaw shaman’s name was Billy Burden. Billy Burden swore by the stone’s power. He said his grandfather had picked it up from the banks of the stream that bordered the farm he had been forced to abandon, the morning he set out on the Trail of Tears that took him to what was then called Indian Territory, but would later be renamed Oklahoma and immortalized on Broadway. Billy Burden’s grandfather had painted the stone with powerful magic symbols using pigments containing the ashes of government treaties that had been broken and burned. Billy Burden had been told by his grandfather that Andrew Jackson had been the greatest enemy of the Choctaw Nation. He’d called him shifty and insincere.

Bumblebee’s mother tells her the hand mirror with the cracked wooden frame is intended for Bumblebee to use in times of doubt and uncertainty to be able to always see herself for who she is, and not allow her head to be turned by the flattery of false admirers. Her mother explains that the flattery of false admirers is something to be especially wary of, since it could lull a young girl into believing in unrealistic expectations. Being buoyantly self-confident, Bumblebee wonders what kind of expectations might ever be unrealistic. 

The third item Bumblebee’s mother gives her every other Friday afternoon is the easiest to carry, but is by far the most important. It is a mother’s warning,
"Remember, only a brother can truly be a brother, and only a sister can truly be a sister; don’t be taken in by unscrupulous substitutes." 

This is a warning Bumblebee is destined to ignore.

Copyright © Michael Kalavik | Year Posted 2021

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