Cocooned by Cornfields
and a lack of breezes,
we wiped sweat,
thankful for iced tea and electric fans.
We dined on country ham
sweet cured and salty,
fresh tomatoes and corn.
Biscuits and sorghum.
A square of cotton tied
to the rickety screen door
kept flies from the house,
those swarms from chicken yard
and hog pen. Grandma's spray can
pumped the porch to life again
after the sun went down.
Morning and evenings
three blocks from the square,
Mrs. Partin milked her cow.
The fading Depression and thrift
were ingrained. Nothing was wasted.
Beauty grew in patches of zinnias,
morning glory vines. Jarflies
sang goodbye to every fading summer.
Iron lungs were real,
yet the world was Dick Tracy,
the Knoxville News Sentinel,
and Saturdays when Grandma
sent her white leghorns
to a floppy death all over the yard.
Aghast, I watched her remove
gizzards, liver, coils of guts,
all forgotten at Sunday's table
awash in gravy, pulley bones,
greasy fingers.
Summer evenings I turned the pillow
to sleep cool, listening to corn
rustling like pages in an album,
yellowed and whispering,
and drifted into dreams
of blood and white feathers,
the green smell and feel
of silken tassels
in sun.
Sue Scalf
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