“Where I Am From”I am from within the same walls,
That I was first brought home to on Hull Street.
Mommy’s voice sung: “Her smile is as bright as the sunshine.
Her eyes, they twinkle like dew.
Her lips are so rosy from her head to her toesy,
I love her! I love her, I do!”
Years of carrying Cuddles and Big Bow Wow around with me.
“How’s your coperachiti gashuating?” asks my Daddy.
The rhyming words of Dr. Seuss,
The coconut tree in Chicka, Chicka, Boom, Boom,
Are You My Mother?,
Willy Woo Woo, Drummer Hoff,
The Little Match Girl, Christmas pop-up books,
And many more great and adventurous stories.
Those days so long ago, spent with my grandparents,
Before I started going to school.
Hop, hop, skip, skip. “King me, please; I made it across the board!”
And playing games of catch with rubber balls.
From paintings, crafts, holiday decorating, books read by Grandpa, movies, and Winnie the Pooh and Tigger, too.
Peering through the fence at the friendly neighborhood dogs,
And watching twittering birds eat their bird seed, all while on the walks with Grandma.
Swinging, sliding, and pedaling a shiny, red trike.
Planting seeds, transplanting fuzzy, green moss,
Finding ladybugs, playing with roly-poly bugs, and Grandma, helping me dig up earthworms, is where I have come from.
My grandma’s storage closet and that large, blue bucket, all brimmed with toys, gidgets, and gadgets.
Only, that bucket doesn’t seem so large to me anymore...
I see blurs of the room around me,
As I twirl round and round.
I am from behind a dark blindfold,
Being guided around the unseen house,
By Maria, Virginia, and their voices.
Sitting on the white shelf in Mom and Dad’s closet,
I wait anxiously for the sound of footsteps.
I can hear myself breathing,
And occasionally I let out a long sigh or fake cough,
Just to give her a hint.
The wall is against my back,
And Dad’s shirts are curtains, concealing me away.
A voice calls my name and the footsteps nearer.
Then the shirts are parted,
Out I come, smiling.
I am from Classical Disney and PBS Kids.
Sitting on the old transformer box with Maria,
And lying on a blanket spread out in the street with Virginia,
We watched the bright, glowing moon, and glittering stars up in the night sky.
A large city where Dad puts in wiring,
And where Mom is employed at my old elementary school.
That cute saber mascot,
Red, white, and black.
Is where I have come from.
The clean, rubbery blue liner, being put in the metal walls of our old pool,
On a hot summer day.
Maria and Virginia were out there,
Playing with me.
They held my hands and pulled me along,
Helping me to skate across the slippery surface,
As the pool slowly filled with fresh, clear hose water.
The clothespins ran along the edge of the pool,
Holding the new liner in place,
As we smoothed the wrinkles with our hands and feet.
From almond trees left mostly bare each year,
Until the hungry chipmunks moved out of our yard.
Making a wish while snapping the dry, crisp wishbone in half,
After a delicious turkey dinner.
The creamy, homemade vanilla ice cream is so cold,
You feel the need to blow on it.
I am from many loving and kind people.
My family, Dad, and Grandpa were there, too.
A piano played “When I Am Baptized”.
Prayers, talks, singing, voices, and that wonderful feeling, were all present.
Whiteness is everywhere.
I entered the font of clear water with Dad.
Soon there was a complete splash,
A towel and a pretty, dry dress.
I felt hands upon my head, joy, peace, and love,
The Spirit and pure cleanness.
