Résumé

I could not tell you the exact time I came into the world, 
or whether I cried or had to be walloped hard 
across the soles of my feet.

A yellowed certificate states: place of birth was a hospital
in an army fort named after the 25th US President.

He was the one who declared before Methodist churchmen 
that the country of my birth was a gift from the gods. 

He had some kind of vision— we were to be taken 
by the hand like little children to be educated, 
uplifted, civilized.

In mountain towns, cottages and chuches sprang up—
their walls reinforced by stone from local quarries.

My father, who never rode a horse, never drove a car or truck,
owned or drew a gun, or hardened his speech
found a job as sheriff.

We lived in the lowest elbow of an alley.
We could walk to the corner store for bread and coconut jam.

If you minded your business you could turn any
of the neighborhood fighting and infidelities  
into stories. 

If a woman fainted at the altar
in the middle of her wedding, she
was already with child.

We knew about ice cream sundaes in footed glass bowls.
We knew where to buy meat freshly slaughtered.

There was music and dancing, 
school plays in which we pushed witches
and trolls into papier-mache ovens.

Pine cones fell on our heads
from a multilayered sky mythical miles away.

You miss it most perhaps at sunup or in the mist,
even before you leave.

Hunters waited with nets in their hands
for birds to fly back to their mountain
under cover of night. 
 
Someone has found a way to capture
in candles the scent of strawberries 
and cypress and loam.