Meet me at the old house.
But not in the living room.
There are too many memories for me, of family squeezed in front of our new marvel of technology,
that fuzzy little black and white TV.
And not in the kitchen!
The air is still pungent with herbed chicken, homegrown turnips and turnip greens, Grandma chiding “Wait until after dinner” as she taps little hands in mock punishment for their cookie thievery.
Oh no no not in the dining room!
The conversations, the arguments, the laughter still ring in my ears.
The announcements of engagements, babies and graduations will always bring me to tears.
Never the bedroom!
My bare feet still feel the roughness of the woolen rug that covered the floor where we slow danced nude to Marvin Gaye and my body feels the lumps of the old mattress where we made love and babies when we could be alone for the day.
Yes, meet me at the old house
But not in the rooms
where old memories entombed
there, will haunt me.
Meet me where the dead grass turned brown like dry ground doesn’t taunt me.
Michelle Andrea Bracken is a retired speech therapist and special education teacher. She is currently a facilitator for a faith-based caregivers support group (Caring for Caregivers) and a poet. Her poems have been featured in Love Letters in Light, a 2021 project of WE RISE and Los Angeles County Public Library, the 2020 and 2022 African American Heritage Month Calendar and Cultural Guides,the Altadena Poetry Review published in 2019, and the Sally Bell Mentor Group 2018 Essay/Poetry Event as a 1st Place and Honorable Mention winner. Publishing her first book at 78-years-old, I Thought We'd Have Forever is about living and caregiving. Infusing poetry and prose, this book chronicles an 8-year pilgrimage of loving, tending, and supporting her husband of 54 years through stroke-induced dementia with the help of her two sons. Mrs. Bracken is in the process of publishing a children’s rhyming picture book that is based on her childhood postwar memories in rural Oklahoma entitled Mama Oza Said. Mrs. Bracken keeps her creative juices flowing by enjoying poetry classes within her community. www.michelleandreabracken.com
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