Writers as Kids: “Inheritance it is to us --/beyond the Art to Earn”*

Writing by Erin Teegarden

Pictured: Evelyn Hampton

the baby rats dart

in between the tracks

 

the gnats flitter and snap

against the overhead light

 

and a boy in a bandana hangs

his legs off the platform ledge

and smokes a cool cigarette…

 

bulbs on a scrolling banner

flash facts: time, date, weather

 

and phrases like “united

we stand” -- and we stand 

 

clustered below a lit word, 

a verb, present tense: CHASE

 

which is the name of a bank

and also what we do for money. 

 

and tonight i miss someone’s 

self-loving hands. tonight i want

 

to digitally re-master the sound

of crickets beneath everything. 

 

i want to see past the shadow

of my own experience. i don’t want 

 

to be a woman alone, half-stoned

waiting for the red line train home;

 

i want to burrow back to the squeaky

clean placemats once laid before me.

 

i want to forget i know how to pose

for a camera flash, forget i know how 

 

to give thanks for all the things 

i’m thankful for.  i want to remember

 

being a girl in a pink party dress, a girl 

still mastering the teacup grasp, 

 

a girl positioned before the ferns, 

before the sunlit window;  i want

 

to be a girl again --small, tended, 

miraculous and fascinating; i 

 

want a wide-eyed hand clap

a generous helping -- 

 

i want a reason to be recorded, 

a reason for recording.

*Poem 321, Emily Dickinson

Comments

[della]

i just love this photo. "ahhh! pumpkin pie!" makes me smile every time i see it.