Ordinary Hazards
Page 3
of pink roses
that crowded every
square inch of vertical space.
A slim mahogany console,
barely wide enough to hold
daily mail and house keys,
crowded the corridor,
squeezed in
next to the radiator.
Everything about this place
seemed crowded.
How could there possibly be
room enough for me?
Too many pairs of eyes
stared in my direction.
I half-hid behind Mr. Klein,
ready to follow him
into the living room,
partly because there was
a dog barking outside
that didn’t sound very friendly,
and partly because
there was no place else
for me to be,
and I wanted to get away.
“Come in! Come in
so that I can close out the cold,”
said the walnut-colored man
named Mr. Buchanan.
“March is not going out like a lamb!”
One by one,
each person was introduced—
the mom, the dad,
Grace, Michael, Kendall, Brad.
We sat around the living room,
forced and fidgeting until
Mr. Klein said his goodbyes.
Mr. Buchanan showed him to the door,
flashing a kind smile that made me shiver.
I’d been fooled by a smile before.
I bit my lip, gripped my suitcase,
and waited for instructions.
“Does she talk?” asked Kendall.
“She will when she wants to,”
said his mom.
If I want to, I thought.
“For now, just take her upstairs.
Show her to her room.”
Kendall, not much bigger than me,
headed upstairs, jabbering away
to fill the spaces
my silence left behind.
All his chatter,
and I heard nothing except
a few creaks in the stairs,
and that one dog barking.
THE ROOM
The dark-paneled walls
absorbed whatever
scraps of moonlight
made it past the windowsill.
Still, the room would do.
I checked the door.
No keyhole. No lock.
No chance anyone
would seal me up in there.
LASSIE’S TWIN
The day after I arrived,
I found out the family
and that barking dog
were related.
His name was Clancy,
and he was big enough to ride.
The first morning,
as I settled on a padded chair
in the oversized kitchen,
a thoroughbred collie
squeezed through
a doggy door
I hadn’t noticed before,
and skidded across
the checkered linoleum,
straight for me.
He sniffed my feet,
then licked them
until I joined him
under the breakfast table.
He flicked his rough tongue
over my glasses,
and when I reached out
to pet him,
he pushed his head
against my palm,
waiting for a rub.
That’s when I knew
the two of us
would get along just fine.
The parakeet,
which spent
as much time
out of the cage as in,
was another matter
altogether.
THE HOUSE ON HILL STREET
With Clancy on my heels,
I looked around the house,
an aging, two-story
brown-shingled affair with an attic,
holding its own as the first house
on the corner of a residential street,
its property edging a building
with a faded sign that said CON EDISON.
At the top of a steep,
nearly vertical incline,
the house afforded a view
of the mighty Hudson River.
The backyard boasted a gap-toothed
white picket fence on one side
with neatly trimmed bushes
on the other,
ready to sprout green
any day now, with spring
right around the corner.
Everything about this place
said good, said safe.
But was it?
SIGN LANGUAGE
A head shake
is all you need.
Up and down for yes,
side to side for no.
Three days in,
and these people still
hadn’t heard my voice.
Petition
Help me, Lord.
I don’t know these people.
If Carol was here,
I’d slip into bed with her.
Do you have a lap
I can crawl up on?
Stay with me.
Please.
And tell my sister
I miss her.
ANOTHER COUNTRY
The backyard pantry
was a fascination.
Big as my room,
it was a place
where rake and pruner,
shovel and shears,
fit neatly, exactly
in their designated space,
seeming more at home
than me.
MANNERS
Early lessons in manners
came back to me.
Yes, please,
no, thank you,
excuse me,
were useful words
to slip in
through the day.
They came in handy
at the dinner table.
Who needed more
than that?
Ken was probably the one
to pry a mouthful
of words from me.
That first week,
he heard me
cry myself to sleep.
The next morning,
he asked why I was crying
and what I was afraid of.
“I wasn’t crying,” I lied,
“and who said I was afraid
of anything?”
Not waiting for an answer,
I brushed past him
and ran down to the kitchen,
worn out from all that
speaking.
STATISTICS
Mrs. Buchanan
took me to see
a man we’ll call Dr. Stern,
a psychologist we foster kids
were assigned to.
Mrs. B. called it
a routine visit
all her new fosters
had to check off the list.
She would know
all about doctors,
being receptionist
for the only black doctor
in town.
She settled me on
a waiting-room bench.
“I’ll be back,” she said,
patting my shoulder before
>
slipping out the door
to run errands.
I swung my legs anxiously
until I heard my name.
An assistant led me
toward Dr. Stern’s office,
his door cracked
as he talked to someone
on the phone.
“Yeah, the next kid’s file’s a mess:
mentally ill alcoholic mother,
victim of abuse,
suffered abandonment—
No telling
what dark thoughts
are swimming
in that little head.
There’s no chance in hell
this kid will make it—
Oh! Listen, I have to go,” he said,
then hung up.
“Hello!”
I stepped into the room,
teeth clenched
tight as my fists.
Who was this stranger to say
I wouldn’t make it?
He didn’t know me for spit!
I gritted my way though
his silly exams,
stoking his words like kindling,
hoping to God he’d choke
on his inkblots
and “games”
of free association,
all of which taught him zero
about who I was,
or would be.
Or could be.
I am not
who he thinks.
I am me.
I am me.
I AM ME!
DEAR CAROL
Dear Carol,
I’m writing you this fake letter
I’ll never get to send.
No one will tell me where they took you.
I need somebody to talk to,
somebody who knows
the right way to say my name.
You hear anything from Mom?
Moms aren’t supposed to leave
little kids home alone.
I hope the corner store
runs out of her stupid brandy.
WAITING
For Mom to call.
For Mom to collect me.
But did she?
The days
rolled themselves into
a big, fat ball,
tangling me into
weeks and months,
and all they did
was take me along
for the ride.
THE SCENT OF PURPLE
Lilacs blooming
outside my window.
Never knew purple
could smell so good.
FRAGILE
1.
Curled into a ball of flannel
and inch-thick cotton bedspread,
my spindly six-year-old body
shivered, nonetheless.
Kendall and Brad in the next room
trampolined on bunk beds,
lost in laughter.
“Quiet!” yelled Mrs. Buchanan,
pausing at my door.
“Everything all right?” she asked.
I nodded. “Well, good night.”
She casually extinguished the light,
and I dove deeper under the covers.
Stepping into the hall,
she closed the door behind herself
and left me cotton-mouthed,
listening for the sound of a key
turning, turning, turning in the lock
before I remembered
there was none.
I won’t cry, no matter what,
I swore, biting my lip,
waiting for something
to reach out for me,
waiting for the tears that
welled up every night
for weeks.
I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid.
I’m not afraid, I repeated,
not until I wasn’t,
but until I finally
fell asleep.
2.
Each night,
the terror returned
seconds after the light
was switched off.
I closed my eyes
and rocked myself
from side to side,
pleading for entrance into
the land of Nod,
too weak to storm the gates.
Hours passed, and
sleep remained elusive.
“Enough!” I said out loud one night,
reaching for my glasses
and creeping from bed.
I inched across the floor
on tiptoe.
With one desperate swipe,
I threw the switch
and sent the demons packing.
Kendall, on his way to
the bathroom, no doubt,
must have noticed
the light under my door
because he softly knocked
and asked, “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” I whispered
loud enough for him
to leave me alone.
I didn’t have much
in the world, but
my fears
were my own.
ISOLATION STATION
The house was full, but with strangers,
and I was there by myself in the dark, in a
tiny pocket of a room with a tiny bed to sleep in
and little space for the fears I’d packed in my suitcase,
which makes no sense, because why would I bring them with me?
And the night sounds, foreign to this city girl, left me tossing and
turning. There was no more room in my head to hold the anger
rising like steam, searing the edges of my brain, there was not even
a shelf where I could stack the questions crying out for answers
that wouldn’t come: Why did Mom love liquor more than Carol,
more than me? Why did Daddy let strangers take us away?
Why did Grandma refuse to come to our rescue?
Why didn’t they love us? Why didn’t anyone love us enough?
Whywhywhywhwhywhywhywhywhywhy? Why?
“Stop!”
I leaped out of bed, switched on the light,
grabbed a piece of paper and a pen,
stabbed the page, and let my thoughts gush like a geyser,
shooting high into the moonless sky,
then falling down on the page I held captive
till every line was stained with my feelings and
the heat of them finally had a chance to cool, and
suddenly, I could breathe, breathe, breathe and
there was once again room enough in my head
and my heart to just—be.
Then I closed my eyes.
And it was morning.
SECRET
I slipped the tear-smudged page
into my dresser drawer.
Those words were strictly for
God and me. Besides,
this writing thing
was some kind of magic trick
I didn’t yet understand,
except for this:
Magicians rarely share
their secrets.
JOURNEY
My life in notebooks
began with this,
a poem here,
an observation there,
a rage of red ink—
each sheet of white
a paper haven.
The blank page
&nb
sp; was the only place
I could make sense
of my life,
or keep record of
each space
I called home.
The daily march of words
parading from my pen
kept me moving
forward.
Notebook
Mrs. B. put a night-light in my room.
Somebody must have told her I’m afraid of the dark.
Don’t tell me lilacs aren’t just the most perfect flower, ever.
I put some in a jelly jar, set them on the table in front of Mrs. B.,
and—poof—her smile came out of hiding.
Lilacs smell
like joy
moving in
for a visit.
BAPTIST BEGINNINGS
One Sunday,
the family took me to
Star of Bethlehem
for the first time.
I slid into the pew,
closed my eyes,
and listened to the organ,
letting the music hug me
on the inside.
Notebook
“Don’t get comfortable,”
my foster sister Grace tells me.
“You don’t belong here.”
Thanks a lot! Like I don’t know
I don’t belong anywhere…
Notebook
I was supposed to go see Mom this weekend, but my visit got canceled. My social worker called and told Mrs. B. and me that Mom had a nervous breakdown, which made no sense. “How can nerves break?” I asked Mrs. B. once she hung up the phone. She told me there was nothing wrong with Mom’s nerves, that she was another kind of sick, in her mind. “Right now, your mom doesn’t know what’s real, and what isn’t.”
The minute she said it, I shivered. I remembered the times I’d seen Mom talking to imaginary friends. “You mean like talking to someone who isn’t there?” I asked Mrs. B. “Exactly,” she said. She asked how I knew, and I just shrugged.
Mrs. B. told me I could visit Mom another time, once she felt better. Now that I know what kind of sick she is, I’m really not in any hurry.
CHANGE OF SEASON
Spring spun into summer,
the sun beat the ground
like a drum, bees hummed,
and flowers flaunted their colors.
Then my mother called,
the one who still
didn’t seem to want me back,
and I was suddenly chilly again