Envoi

Envoi

1

The church ladies all ached
with age. Their hair stiff as steel wool,
faces grayed as frozen meat,
flashing quick smiles
when Mom served
pineapple upside down cake
on china from the hutch we mustn’t touch:
oil the pan first next time, don’t beat
the eggs so much,
this was something they knew more
about than this young, pretty
girl who lived in her mind and hid
stacks of Harlequin Romance novels.
Born in St. Louis and stuck in a town of 7000
souls; Wynne, The City With a Smile
(in Old English, she once told them, wynne meant joy
and tried to smile when they said college
sure didn’t teach you how to cook.)

2

A man once came to our door selling encyclopedias.
The church ladies warned her–
he’ll ask if your husband’s here,
and when he finds out you’re alone, a little
thing like you? They ushered him away, threatened
to call the police, their husbands; we’re armed,
they said, these women who knew as much
about the world as a catfish knows
about life outside the pond. My mother caught him
on the way out. “Ask anyone around,
I’ve been selling this route for years,” he said.
“Those women are fools.”
She saw something she’d almost forgotten
in his angry eyes
and bought everything he had.

C.L. Bledsoe

from "My Mother Making Donuts"; a Chapbook
Posted over on The Dead Mule