When I think about where I’m from
I think of fat bottoms encased in high-waisted stretch denim,
Babydoll crop tops, daisy dukes,
And sitting around a picnic table on a late summer’s afternoon
Drinking everclear and southern comfort and acting like we were grown.

I think about the familiar ritual circle
of shelling peas into a well-worn metal basin

-plink- -plink-

Drinking sweet tea from mason jars while engaging in casual racism…
Gossip about that ‘negro girl who works down at the Piggly Wiggly’
and my uncle who won’t own a red truck because he says red is an N-word color.

I think about how they pronounce words like
iron and wash and libraries –

“arn”
“warsh”
“liberry”

And say caricature phrases like

“fixin to”

and

“I reckon so”

but make fun of me for my lack of accent
as my roots start to dissolve.

I think of the unloaded shotgun always propped
in the corner of the closet where we played dress up
I can still smell the leather of Mamaw’s shoes
The roll of cinnamon certs in her handbag
And the oddly pervasive woodsmoke aroma of a farmhouse that had no fireplace.

There was a snake under the table once
It blended into the rug, rough and tightly coiled
Like the alzheimers coiling itself invisibly around my grandmother’s brain.
Nobody saw it until it moved but then
We moved and there were screams and
Someone chased it out with a broom
When I think it probably just wanted somewhere warm to lay.

I think of Papaw’s hands,
Big fingers that liked to crumble cornbread into a glass of milk
Calloused hands that preferred to shake hello and goodbye rather than hug,
But so gentle with the barn cats that played at his ankles.

I don’t remember the last time I saw my grandparents
In my memories it’s always late afternoon
Bleeding into evening when the fireflies come out
And you catch them in jars with no thought to their fate,
Just a fleeting piece of nature to be devoured and consumed, like me –

The last bud on a
Dying branch of a family tree
I neither know
Nor understand.