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POETRY
Batman next door
The old woman in her pink long johns and red flannel
nightshirt put trembling hand on the bed, pushed herself upright,
swung her pink-clad, stick-like legs over the edge and looked at Batman.
The sturdy caped figure, hair in damp spikes from his bath, repeated his
question. Want your light off, Gram? Fragile, barely there, she
smiled with a fully vigorous astonishment. I knew then she would be
safe all through the night, with Batman in the next room.
-- Marjorie Kowalski Cole Ester, Alaska
CONDEMNED
Our house was not condemned. But the one behind us
where Betty Carlson lived was, and not only she but Mary Ramsey, Lanny
Kinnear, Rita and Donnie Strom, their children and Eunice as well lived
there in
six units three on a side overflowing with children so much so that Eddie
Carlson fell out of a second-floor window. One of a pair of red drapes hung
over the sill marking the fall, on the ground below the blood redder than
the faded drape above.
The yellow sign nailed to the wall of that
house read: This building CONDEMNED by the Department of Public Health. I
read early and well, knew what those heavy black capitals meant, the
stigma attached to anyone living there.
Nobody moved. The city did not
evict. But living under that interdict was the shame of Hester Prynne
multiplied but mollified by being shared. Shared yes, but nevertheless,
unlike the oblivious Pearl, the children involved knew they were
powerless,
forced to breathe in classroom air, polluted with
whispers from recess: Betty Carlsons house is condemned. I knew.
She was my neighbor. I kept my distance from her contagion. Her leprosy,
her social AIDS, her stigmata could soon be mine.
We moved from that
house when I was twelve thereby escaping a visible wound of black and
yellow on the front door, reminiscent of the woven Star of David worn by
Jews on their jackets in the Second World War.
On a recent visit to
that neighborhood I found buildings razed, gone -- trees and broken
cement foundations all that was left of a war zone lost in
time.
Engaged now in another war -- waged by the wealthy on the urban
poor, a racist elitist war of deception -- the victims turn guns on each
other and everyone dies.
-- Judith Robbins Whitefield, Maine
Untitled
I am a nonconforming Catholic, A dogma free
Christian, A would-be Buddhist, A latent Hindu, An admirer of the
Sufi, A curious observer of the Shinto and Celtic, A student of the
Tao, And a brother to all sorts of indigenous tribal religions.
I
have kissed the God of many faces
And, as for you, my friend, If
you have kissed one, You have kissed them all.
-- Michael Reitz Cleveland
Visitation
I walk straight ahead, choose not to see an old lady
tied to her wheelchair, crumpled like empty clothes, choose not to
imagine pain as an old mans arm flails the table before him,
choose not to hear others mutter suffering.
I go to my fathers
room, past remnants of people scattered like empty shells, leaning on
crab- footed canes, using start-and-stop walkers. They slide snail
feet, inching wheelchair houses around the square, to nowhere.
My
father sits, twice tied at shoulders and hips, staring at a blank
screen. I wheel him to the dining room where smoking is
allowed.
After two cigarettes and three thin cigars are
smoked without pause, he signs himself absently, but perfectly, from
forehead to chest, left shoulder to right.
-- Mary Willette Hughes Waite Park, Minn.
Use the links below to read previous Poetry pages. Use
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1999 in POETRY
2000 in POETRY
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Please send poems to NCR POETRY, 115 E. Armour Blvd., Kansas City MO
64111-1203. Or via e-mail to poetry@natcath.org or fax (816)
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National Catholic Reporter, September 29,
2000
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