When Momma was Gone

This is a poem I wrote a few years back about the summers I spent with my grandparents here in Oklahoma while my mom was working in California. She usually left in the middle of June or early July, and she stayed there until November. The feelings I had d

 

Desolate Summers

Wading chest deep in

Cool river waters that

Pressed firmly causing me

To lean into the swift current.

 

Swinging a rake in

Overhead arcs; attempting

To sever apples from their

Life giving stems.

 

Solitude was rare…

 

Sharing one room

Five cousins

Occasionally swinging

Balled up white knuckled fists to

Settle disputes over

Territory and sharing

Laughter within minutes that

Dragged on like

Molasses on grandpa’s pancakes.

 

The smell of burning red oak, elm,

And Marlboro 100’s in the air.

 

Never willing to trade those miserably

Wonderful river bottom summers for

A California daddy drowning in

Keystone Light; waiting

Until intricate patterns of

Autumn frost signaled

Mom to fly home.