Internment

Ob lig a tion/keep in rhythm/ obligation, ready begin. (Remember the hand clapping game?)


Set the table/wash the dishes/set the table/wash the dishes.
Iron shirts/pants and hankies/ Iron them well for no thank-ees.
Miss Independence, make people happy take some help/woman's libber.
Son of a bitch/son of a bitch/brat/ damn you to hell you sonofabitch.
You hurt your mother you hurt your mother you hurt your mother.
If you are too sick to go to church, you are too sick to go anywhere.
You don't have friends, you are so rude, you don't have friends, you are so rude.
Of course he loves you, he's your father. Of course he loves you, he's your father.


Now I see them, written out, I know they are my parent's fears and angers. Passed down, a toxic inheritance. Both together. Left to me.

I always knew there would be nothing left, hell, nothing to start with. The debts excised. Only scars to show where the curse was laid. Now, I am left to execute the remains. Bury them, after scraping the bones, cover them with ochre, proper words all intoned.

My rabbi/sherpa/warrior/nun/shaman shakes the rattles, moans the death rites, frees me from the dead, lays a hand on my shoulder in compassion, and is gone.

My hands sting from the slapping, my throat sore with shouting, but my heart, finally, truly, at ease.

Life will be hard and soft, as it always is in turns. But the dead will bury the dead, and I will dance.

For a while yet, anyway.