The Papers by Roberta Schultz ©2010
Intro:
Babe sits at the table
in the bright, white kitchen light
and pours a drop of coffee in my milk.
She laughs like a coyote at Red Skelton's latest plight.
My head leans on her knees that feel like silk.

She hands me half a Brillo pad and
we begin to scrub
the stove, the sink, the table and its chrome.
When gray linoleum's shining and
there's nothing left to rub,
we fill our cups and talk about her home.

Chorus;
Oval portrait of her love: all that woolly, black hair raging,
glowering at us from above on the wall.
And the praying hands of Jesus in a golden, lighted frame
sees us all, he sees us all.

"Well, I was doing mill work when I was just your age."
She says this as a fact, without regret.
Then she pulls out some papers from a little cedar chest--
a ritual that I won't soon forget.

"My dad was from Montana, a Blackfoot Indian boy,
the meanest indins in the old wild West."
I touch the papers' edges like
they are the sacred scrolls.
Her story takes the turn I like the best.

Chorus

"My daddy and his daddy joined
the troupe of Buffalo Bill.
They traveled east and camped out at the zoo.
They played the part of indians in the wild west traveling show.
That wasn't hard because that part was true.

When grandpa got in trouble in a bar in Portsmouth town,
they sold my daddy to a farm up there.
These papers tell how daddy would work 'til 21 for
readin;, 'ritin, 'rithmatic and care."

Chorus

Babe folds up the papers with her hands so smooth and brown
and tucks them very gently in their place.
The ceremony ended, we drink our coffee down
and share a little silence in our space.

Chorus.