Out of the Dust: Winter 1934 - Spring 1934

From the earliest I can remember
I’ve been restless in this
little Panhandle shack we call home,
always getting in Ma’s way with my
pointy elbows, my fidgety legs.

They pledged revenge on the rabbit population;
wagering who could kill more.

Those men,
they used to be best friends.
Now they can’t be civil with each other.

She always gets testy, about me playing,
even though she’s the one who truly taught me.

Anyway, this time I caught her in the
slow stirring of biscuits,
her mind on other things,
maybe the baby growing inside her, I don’t know,
but anyhow,
she was distracted enough

I was determined enough,
this time I got just what I wanted.
Permission to play at the Palace.

We shake out our napkins,
spread them on our laps,
and flip over our glasses and plates,
exposing neat circles,
round comments
on what life would be without dust.

She came to this house and found gaps in the walls,
a rusty bed, no running water,
and that piano,
gleaming in the corner.

Ma told me to
cover the beds,
push the scatter rugs against the doors,
dampen the rags around the windows.

One quarter of the wheat is lost:
blown away or withered up.

"A pond would work,” she says,
sounding crusty and stubborn.

Instead, she goes out to the chickens
and
her anger,
simmering over like a pot in an empty kitchen,
boils itself down doing chores.

But in just a couple months,
after the baby is born,
those apples will be ready
and we’ll make pies
and sauce
and pudding
and dumplings.
and cake
and cobbler
and have just plain apples to take to school

On Sunday,
winds came,
bringing a red dust
like prairie fire,
hot and peppery,
searing the inside of my nose,
the whites of my eyes.

Ma said
okay,
but only for the summer,
and only if she didn’t hear me gripe how I was tired,
or see me dragging my back end around,
or have to call me twice upon a morning,
or find my farm chores falling down,
and only if Arley’s wife, Vera, kept an eye on me.