The Southpaw
I’m a southpaw,
one of those left-handed,
upside down,
have to curl my arm to write,
backwards individuals,
liv’in-the-left-life
in a right-handed world.
Think It’s easy, e.g.,
being a leftie?
Think again...
we’re out of place at dinners,
have to master backwards scissors,
built specifically for righties and
we are forced to learn everything, in reverse.
We wear permanent spiral wire imprints
on our left arm from trying to pen
our feelings into a right-handed
spiral-bound notebook.
One day, I decided to break the rules
and now all of my journals are written
back-to-front, blowing busybody minds.
Forget writing calligraphy,
a left-handed, oblique set of pen nibs
costs twice what the right-handed ones do
and they are about as elusive as garden gnomes;
what, you don’t believe me?
Try to find a set, I dare ya!
I’ll bet there’s not a store in your town
that stocks them, even though lefties
exist in huge numbers.
I spent 20 years trying to do calligraphy
with a right-handed, oblique pen;
(thank God for the web or
I’d never have found a set.)
In parochial school,
the nuns forced me to
turn my paper to the right;
now I am a half ambidextrous leftie.
This did not set well with my Mother
who wanted me to be the individual that I
was born to be...a leftie.
So, I turn my paper to the right, alright,
curl my arm into a question mark and
write upside down.
but , I play a right-handed guitar.
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