Scratched 45 of Humilty

It was hard living

in four small rooms

with mama talking shit

and dad two arms

holding a newspaper.

My sisters and I crawled

through that one way

conversation collecting stones

for our baggage.

Dad didn’t always keep his silence.

He had expert aim with his rifle words

that could hit mama’s last nerve every time.

A volume up radio tuned

to WHB was target practice

when dad shot sniper fire from the lip,

“Rock n roll isn’t music,”

Mama would look down her gun barrel

to pull the trigger with, “Shut the hell up.”

Our family only had one family tradition,

an annual Christmas fight.

Mama hated the season of pine needles

dropping from a scrawny tree

and two weeks wrapped in lights.

Words would fly in the frosted back and forth

until dad would proclaim,  “I think we all

should go our separate ways!”

Shell shocked by the expected

we girls would wipe tears

while thinking, “I wonder if Santa

will leave us a doll before

we leave for separate ways?”

Life was shouts lived behind

the sound proof glass of neighbors

too far away to hear it.

My sisters and I were too young

to know reasons, our parents 

too wounded to find healing.

  

As I think back I can hear, be it ever so humble….

Scratch that 45, humility might have been

in the plaster, but it didn’t live in flesh
glued to baggage a family didn't know how to unpack.

©Susie Clevenger 2013

Ok, over at Real Toads Herotomost ( Corey Rowley) wanted us to write something he could feel. Real Toads ~ Friday Night Raw
I need to clarify that in the poem the reference to Mama's gun barrel was a verbal one. It wasn't until my parents passing that we found out about circumstances in their lives that contributed to their pain and tension. Most people carry baggage. There are those of us who are blessed enough to find ways to no longer carry it.