Reminisce
Location
I remember the traditions
like Thanksgiving on Friday
because nana wouldn’t get off
work to do a full day of cooking
and We always open the knitted stockings
first on Christmas
because they’re a preview of what’s to come
I remember my mother’s creamy skin
and her burnt sienna curly hair, identical
but not as thick as mine
I remember my dad’s gentle but firm embrace
My little brother’s constant questioning
I walk through the narrow eggshell
hallway into my mother’s library of a living room saunter
over to one faux wooden bookshelf
I gaze at the altar of memories
Old photographs of my papa’s mother and father
Young before cancer took their lives away
My nana and her parents stand straight
as a board for the camera
as if they were the American Gothic portrait
of the old farmer and wife
I don’t know much about nana’s family
Grew up in Kentucky
A Baptist preacher’s kid
Stories papa tells
the autobiography he says
he’s going to write
“We passed by the all-white school to our one room
schoolhouse every day. There’s still some bricks
left where it used to be.
I’m gonna take you there one summer.”
I remember Garrison and Amaya’s births
Their lukewarm bodies
that could fit in my cupped hands
Amaya’s cold fingers wrapped
around the top of my index finger
The squeeze she gave
me before I never saw her again
The spirit tree their ashes
are spread around
The splintering sunset
orange bark
Unlike any other tree in Central Park
I remember Grandma’s “mmhm”s
and “uhuh”s
her southern Georgia twang
Capped gold tooth revealed when she laughs
Grandpa’s “Come ‘ere baby girl”s
and “Come sit on pawpaw’s lap”s
I walk outside and breathe the Old Louisville air
The air I was raised in
The air I remember