Niagara of Memory iii. Older Boy

When I was in third grade

(I think that makes me eight years old)

my mother and father

moved to a new house

down near Elmira.

Elmira  was a sad small city

where the belt had rusted early

factories closed, jobs lost

but still, neat green lawns

and well-kept houses.

The weeds came later,

after Dr. King died.

My parents house was one of these

a small patch of green

White and single-storied

with only two bedrooms.

My brother and I shared a room

he's still wet the bed (he was five years old)

so, the room always had a scale and acrid odor

an awful smell that I remember so well.

On the day that we left Sanborn,

my grandmother leaned close to me

and handed me a little card with a phone number

and said "if you ever need me, just call."

And then she said, in a voice that was meant to be heard

skedaddle, go home with your mommy.

By then, I never called her "Mama" or "mommy"

by then, she no longer had a name or title.

In my little boy mind,

she had lost name and title

and was only called mother

in the abstract third person --

"my mother said this", or "my mother said that."

When I spoke to her,

I no longer use the title.

I just spoke.  She never noticed.

I tried to use the little card

only once. It didn't work.