Blue laws lock up the fun,
tie Sunday down with the fidgety,
sit-still binds of a sermon.
Nothing to do, nothing to do,
plodding through the last school-free
hours: a martyrdom of quiet
till Daddy says, “Get in the car.”
We drive to the shopping center,
a gray ghost town.
All those empty parking spaces
lined up like grave stones.
Not even a cola for sale.
We stop in front of Roses
dime store, where my horse
is saddled up, waiting.
Like Daddy, he’s all mine today.
No line, no pushing,
no too-busy excuses.
Daddy feeds in a dime
and I’m off across the wide
range. He leans against a post,
smoking a cigarette.
In twenty minutes, we’ll be back
home, my pardner and me.
Alarie Tennille (alariepoet.com) serves on the Emeritus Board of The Writers Place in Kansas City, Missouri. She’s the author of Running Counterclockwise and Spiraling into Control. Alarie’s poems have appeared in numerous journals including Margie, Poetry East, I-70 Review, Southern Women’s Review and Midwest Quarterly Review.
Such a fine reminiscence, Alarie. It is full of the music of memory. Well done, indeed. Poppy
ReplyDeleteThank you, Poppy.
DeleteThank you, Poppy.
DeleteLove this memory, Alarie! I remember those days fondly myself and remember my partner (Daddy) doing the same thing for me I'm surprised we never bumped into one another there on the range... Oh what lovely days one thin dime would buy...
ReplyDeleteThanks, ballroom chick. I'm very late finding your post, but still appreciate it.
ReplyDelete