On Western Massachusetts 

I shut the wooden door, so it slaps against its frame and run down the three steps. My feet are bare and press against the grass the way they never would in the city. I scan the surrounding landscape. The taxis are the lily pads and the pigeons are the chipmunks running across the yard. Instead of people, I find I am surrounded by deciduous trees in a forest. It gets lonely when they never respond to me saying hello, but I know city goers would do the same.

On my Grandmother’s House

Confederate towns are often places I don’t spend my time visiting. In Emmitsburg, Maryland you wouldn’t think any different. We always entered through her back door, never the front. Her fireplace held a statue of Jesus and Sesame Street figurines were left scattered on the floor. Rika watched from the couch panting under my step grandfather’s heavy arm. Upstairs there was the clown room with dolls sitting in a line upon her shelf. That’s where I made my father sleep.

On the Watermelon Room

The purple room was for my family, the blue was for Olivia, and the green was for Pam. Drea of course had the watermelon room. Seeds lined the walls with slices of melon lying in between them. We never questioned why the floors were so cold or why she lived alone. It was by Mount Abram surrounded by cattails that we’d crush between our fingers and let blow in the wind. Beside it was a wooden barn tall and bare except for the green bugle my cousin used to play. We’d run through the back with splinters in our toes. Feet covered in bandages. There was one time we found a snake skin coiled on the porch. It was my mom who pointed it out and the lines that made its texture. Once it had a life and bore the Maine wind. I wonder where he and the barn are now. After it was sold did they paint over the watermelon room?

On Frogs

Every night we catch them hopping across the hot pavement at around 10 pm. When I make a right they jump left. I set my hands beneath them and curl my fingers but their backs slip through as they launch into the pond. She had picked one up to set him on me but as the lights went out it grew too dark. Flip flop bottoms showed the leg that was crushed. We placed him and watched as he struggled to hide under the lily pads. I was a bystander.