Black Snakes and Happy
Connell’s Point, Arkansas
Mama’s green dress and hair in a tight bun holding me on the old wooden porch of the tiny parsonage, while daddy and my big brother bring Happy and her twelve puppies around the corner of the house,
looking for all the world like an unspotted version of One Hundred and One Dalmatians, and me, a two-year old sitting on the porch amazed, transfixed and a little horrified, only now realizing this is my first memory of life.
Daddy and my big brother rush into the house where I am eating my biscuit with syrup and butter
“come see, come see, daddy killed a black snake!” my brother yelled. Biscuit in one sticky hand and mama holding the other I tumble out on the front porch to see a long black snake at the base of the steps neatly chopped into twelve bloody pieces. I peer over the edge down the three feet to the dirt
and finish my biscuit.
Across the way stood an old school house once painted, now gray clapboard rotted and sagging
and a poor family squatted there for a while. Twelve children, more boys than girls and the older boys would walk the top of the schoolyard swing sets like balance beams until they fell and moaned in the dirt.
My father the preacher, late for his own service with a washcloth spit washing our dirty faces and hands
and walking us across the dirt road to the church where we all sang a capela hymns and spirituals until daddy would get up and tell us stories.
Old men, to me, at age three, though much younger than I am now sitting after Sunday dinner with the preacher and his family, telling tales while the women cleaned up and all I remember is the smell of a house too many years heated by wood smoke
Two little boys in a stall shower, in a bathroom built onto the back porch, as an afterthought when indoor plumbing came, leaning out the back screen door to holler at mama, picking strawberries
in the little strip between the house and the cotton field, “mama where are the towels?” Mama in her yellow rubber gloves and straw hat wiping her brow with her arm, straightening, then peeling the gloves
and coming in to dry us off.
Vickie Moore where have you gone?
Behind the parsonage with the weeping willow tree that shaded our window, behind the cotton field,
lived Macleod Moore and his wife and daughter. On nice days all four of us would walk back the dirt road,
chasing grasshoppers and missing mud puddles and we brothers would play with Vickie, who had a nice toy box
and whose age fell half way in between ours but I was only three when we moved away. I never saw Vickie again
until my 14th summer when we were visiting and I saw this pretty girl in pigtails bouncing down the freshly graded road driving her daddy’s pickup truck. This past year when I called my old friend Donna Ray
to tell my mama had died, I asked about Vickie. “She, and her husband both died, a few years ago.
Cancer.”
Mama’s green dress
and hair in a tight bun
Holding me on the old wooden porch
of the tiny parsonage,
while daddy and my big brother
bring Happy and her twelve puppies
around the corner of the house,
looking for all the world like
an unspotted version
of One Hundred and One Dalmatians,
and me, a two-year old sitting
on the porch amazed,
transfixed and a little horrified,
only now realizing this is
my first memory of life.
Daddy and my big brother
rush into the house
where I am eating my biscuit with syrup and butter
“come see, come see, daddy killed a black snake!”
my brother yelled.
Biscuit in one sticky hand
and mama holding the other
I tumble out on the front porch
to see a long black snake
at the base of the steps
neatly chopped into twelve bloody pieces.
I peer over the edge
down the three feet to the dirt
and finish my biscuit.
Across the way
stood an old school house
once painted, now gray
clapboard rotted and sagging
and a poor family squatted there for a while.
Twelve children,
more boys than girls
and the older boys would walk the top
of the schoolyard swing sets
like balance beams
until they fell
and moaned in the dirt.
My father the preacher,
late for his own service
with a washcloth
spit washing our dirty faces and hands
and walking us across the dirt road
to the church where we all sang
a capela hymns and spirituals
until daddy would get up
and tell us stories.
Old men,
to me,
at age three,
though much younger
than I am now
sitting after Sunday dinner
with the preacher and his family,
telling tales
while the women cleaned up
and all I remember is the smell
of a house too many years
heated by wood smoke
Two little boys in a stall shower,
in a bathroom built onto the back porch,
as an afterthought when indoor plumbing came,
leaning out the back screen door
to holler at mama, picking strawberries
in the little strip between the house
and the cotton field,
“mama where are the towels?”
Mama in her yellow rubber gloves
and straw hat wiping her brow with her arm,
straightening,
then peeling the gloves
and coming in to dry us off.
Vickie Moore where have you gone?
Behind the parsonage
with the weeping willow tree
that shaded our window,
behind the cotton field,
lived Macleod Moore and his wife and daughter.
On nice days
all four of us would walk back the dirt road,
chasing grasshoppers and missing mud puddles
and we brothers would play with Vickie, who had a nice toy box
and whose age fell half way
in between ours
but I was only three when we moved away.
I never saw Vickie again
until my 14th summer
when we were visiting
and I saw this pretty girl
in pigtails bouncing down the freshly graded road
driving her daddy’s pickup truck.
This past year when I called
my old friend Donna Ray
to tell my mama had died,
I asked about Vickie.
“She, and her husband both
died, a few years ago.
Cancer.
