i. Childhood - Natchez Bungalow
Forever frugal, my granny would bake banana nut bread
But leave out the bananas and the nuts
A would-be spice cake served at the once-a-year silver-plattered dinner
And snacks a plenty for us children
Everyone got their gifts in reused boxes,
The name tags actually holiday cards from the years past,
Her cursive loose and looping
Like the way she’d overline her lips in fuschia tones
Equality was always the theme - the same odd socks or too-small sweaters
Because we’d grown through the year
or she bought the wrong size
since that’s all the clearance rack gods bequeathed her with
And still, we were delighted by it all
The silver tinsel still hanging on by a plastic thread
Bing Crosby spinning on the turntable
In the morning, we’d wake to toys under the tiny tree
And buddle up in warm coats to stand at the end of the sidewalk,
A sharp point cut on a sloping hill, for the local neighborhood parade
Santa waving from a red corvette like he was Elvis instead of a saint
Peppermints and strawberry candies littered at our feet
We picked them up like they were jewels
Safely ensconced in a Winn-Dixie grocery bag
ii. Adulthood - Christmas Music on the Radio
December already has her hooks in me
even though she's 30 days into the future
I drive home in the dim gray light to a home
where all the drawers and closets have come undone
I eat a slice of rye bread slathered with butter and honey
the deep tang offsetting the fatty sweetness
All my angles are softer now
my sharp edges hidden by age and weight
the wrinkles that never seem to show
and the greys that are slowing growing in
Give me full moons and drams of whiskey
not dirty dishes and jury summons
Give me kisses and whispers against my neck
not turning away a divided bed and life with the family
we can't create, along with the one we can't keep happy
Take your trees and twinkling lights
your sales and postcard invites
let me live in this space on my own for a bit
the wall will hit
it always does
an invisible crash against the immovable force of time
memory
and everything that's lost in between
Rachel Cathleen Stewart holds a B.A. in English: Creative Writing from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Her poems have appeared in Gingerbread House Literary Magazine, Soft Cartel, Spill Yr Guts, TigerShark, Sequoya Review, Mannequin Envy, Poems Niederngasse, Unlikely Stories, and Slow Trains Literary Journal. Her non-fiction prose has appeared in XOJane.
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