Poem
Olive Senior
hurricane story, 1988
hurricane story, 1988
hurricane story, 1988
My mother wasn’t christenedImelda but she stashed a cache
of shoes beneath the bed.
She used to travel to Haiti,
Panama, Curacao, Miami,
wherever there was bargain
to catch – even shoes that
didn’t have match. Back home
she could always find customer
come bend-down to look and talk
where she plant herself on
sidewalk. When the hurricane
hit, she ban her belly and bawl,
for five flights a day to Miami
grounded. No sale and her shoes
getting junjo from the damp (since
the roof decamp) and the rest
sitting in Customs, impounded.
My mother banked between her
breasts, lived out her dreams
in a spliff or two each night.
Since the storm, things so tight
her breasts shrivel, the notes
shrinking. Every night she there
thinking. Every morning she get up
and she wail: Lawd! Life so soak-up
and no bail out. To raatid!
© 1994, Bloodaxe Books
From: Gardening in the Tropics
Publisher: Bloodaxe Books,
From: Gardening in the Tropics
Publisher: Bloodaxe Books,
Poems
Poems of Olive Senior
Close
hurricane story, 1988
My mother wasn’t christenedImelda but she stashed a cache
of shoes beneath the bed.
She used to travel to Haiti,
Panama, Curacao, Miami,
wherever there was bargain
to catch – even shoes that
didn’t have match. Back home
she could always find customer
come bend-down to look and talk
where she plant herself on
sidewalk. When the hurricane
hit, she ban her belly and bawl,
for five flights a day to Miami
grounded. No sale and her shoes
getting junjo from the damp (since
the roof decamp) and the rest
sitting in Customs, impounded.
My mother banked between her
breasts, lived out her dreams
in a spliff or two each night.
Since the storm, things so tight
her breasts shrivel, the notes
shrinking. Every night she there
thinking. Every morning she get up
and she wail: Lawd! Life so soak-up
and no bail out. To raatid!
From: Gardening in the Tropics
hurricane story, 1988
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