Love is rising like a spring
he promised he would never leave
his body is gone carried past many of streams.....but he comes back to make love to me......cause he loves me
I know I can, I know I can feeling like that damn engine in that damn childhood story
Cept this here is real life and I am running out of answers. I am sitting on this concrete ground with a Popsicle stick in my hand side pressed against this perfect red brick wall trying to make a puddle, a spring rise up and quench my thirst. This here sun ain’t offering no help, no sir it is beaming down on me like I needs to be dried from the spinning machine, hanging on a line. Funny how I use to lay awake in my bed awaiting the Suns’ return, wanting to have him pull symphony from between my thighs. He brings lyrical tunes to my lips and makes my hips sway under his heat. The moisture he summons at will, made me giddy. He would lift aroma from tiny flowers as I pass, letting them tickle my nose. He would kiss my skin leaving his mark covering my every inch, even in colder weathers he’d drop in tickling my toes for a spell. He’d never leave me for to long though, he check in for here and there and never did I think he would beam down on me like now….what have I done to deserve such treatment? The Popsicle stick was making white marks on the ground hadn’t crack through any of the grey, could almost be looked at as chalk if her sweat wasn’t interfering with the process. Tears started to weld-up from frustrations of betrayal. We built this wall together, laid this concrete for his grill, you know for family cookouts and things, family that word slow down the notion of water springing folding her exposed legs she put her hand on her womb empty, know sounds of heartbeats, or motion sounds like listening to whales or dolphins even sharks in the deep, not even sounds of hunger just emptiness. She put both hands to her head, she had long stop the noises of the day around her, now she must stop that probing bitch inside of her, she always wants answers, and she is never at a lost for question, a nag, a fucking nag. If she could stop those noises she’d be just fine and her work here will be finished. See Lisa knew there was a flowing river under there that was the exact spot of her grandmother’s garden, she grew bloomed anything and everything imaginable, but Cotton had to have that side of the yard, he promised that the other side would do just as good for the garden and by him being from the south and all. I knew he was right hence his name being born in a cotton field. Yes he was quite a spell older than me but when his breezes blew past me, it lifted every hair off my body like a magnet. He lifted and twisted hair on my body that I didn’t even no was suppose to be there. Lord and his words cut through me like wild fire wit a little help from gasoline. He made me glow ev’erybody said so. Yes he made me glow. He helped me bury Momma she had been ailing for so long. Her eyes told me know but without words how could I help her to see that it wasn’t I who choose him it was my soul, my inside. I tried to tell her from the first moment I laid eyes on him it was like my body had a mind of its own. I was sitting under moonlight just looking up at the stars when chills started covering my skin and before I could move his body was pressed up against mine, his hands covering my mouth I felt fire on my neck, he said don’t worry child, I came to love you. His other hand was climbing my leg so fast when it reached its destination I lost my breath, again fire covering my entire body, and he covered my mouth with his and I didn’t know what to do. I felt his tongue thick in my mouth and throat and I though about fish in a bowl. When he turned me to him, he exposed my breast said letting beauty free, running his hands through my roots pulling my head up to see blackness and stars so big like they had come to life, watching what he was doing. I ain’t never had nobody touch my like that……Clyde and I always stopped at kissing and momma wanted us to marry, he was daddy’s friend son. He’d take me out on the town sometimes you know kicking it at basement parties, but I knew he whatin the one for me. Cotton said softly in between breaths and breaks from my chest,” you remember me?” still haven’t caught my breath I shook my head up and down, he smiled sure you do I felt you, I was digging you baby.” Now I was laying on the ground with my gown ripped open to my waist and his fingers inside my panties, inside of me. I knowed I be here tonight so did you, I knowed you be waiting for me cause I willed you too. I knowed you give it to me just like this cause you knowed you gone be my wife didn’t you? His finger got still waiting on an answer and I didn’t wont his finger to stop moving, I was burning from on the inside and it felt so good. His wife? Cotton stopped altogether looking down on me just like the moon waiting on an answer, I caught my breath and looked him in his eyes, and they was just as full as the moon cept dark…..I don’t even believe I know your name, he starting easing his finger out and I couldn’t stop my head from saying no, he stopped still looking at me Cotton I heard fall so unfamiliar out of my mouth yes…..he ease his finger a little deeper inside of me and I lost sight for a second. He was back in view now, you gon be my wife right? I am only sixteen, I don’t know you slowly again he started out, laying his face close to mine I want to give you something that feels much better than this but I won’t let you use me, his finger was almost completely out, when he could see my puzzle ness, he disappeared and I went to set-up when his hand force me down then a felt a wave of moistness cover me my lips and the same thickness the danced inside of my mouth was the co prate of heat opening me say yes Lisa say yes Lisa say yes…………a voice came deep within my soul and yes was the only thing it would say. See he said my granddaddy taught me how to pick fruit, and I knowed you were ready for the plucking. Under these skies I take you as my wife you hear, Cotton said to me before he eased into me making my stars shine, but I will give you time to handle all the closing of your business. You are my wife and he loved me so tender that I could feel the earth moving under my head, I felt all the little creatures moving about, Lord the moon grew so bright and full I swear I hear her singing. See that was where the idea came from to build a red brick wall separating the back yard from neighbors so we could return every now and then to the spot my blood ran green into dark brown and sprouted flowers. He made all the descions it was cool though cause he always asked me how I felt about this and about that and he let me love him ever night what else did I need. Outside though he had such a temper niggas looked up to him and well others respected or was just scare as hell of him. He always knew what to do, what to say and when he smiled he could melt the tip of an iceberg, he would tell me of the pussy cats that chased him wanted a piece of him and he would laugh at my anger, then laying any thoughts of cheating to rest in me that I might have, I am a prize he would say that you won, only you I’d make those pussies sweat like the sun and leave em dry. Then he’d kiss me truth be told he saw how men eyes would set on my behind as well and couldn’t stand for me to be alone wit anyone. Cotton momma wrote me telling me why he had to leave the south, why she had sent him north, “man child like him stood no chance there in the south had too much pride, too much spirit in him to breath there, she had also told me what happen to his father when he was thirteen. How Cotton wrapped a burlap bag round his dad and single handedly got him down from out of that tree. Cotton had always been a big boy. He brought me a far as Virginia told him I had no interest in going north, but he wouldn’t let me stay in Mississippi. I just moved back here recently had to come back to where my husband spirit would reach me, child she said I would learn about that much later in life, that was only a year ago……and after all the love making Cotton and I did I still remain empty, dry. The thought of dryness brought her back to the thirst and why she was sitting out in the sun, trying to scratch-up concrete, for water. Lisa picked back up the Popsicle stick and rubbed it back and forth. Back and forth with enuf pressure to make lines but not enuf pressure to break the little stick. Baby you got me and ifn’ you didn’t you need to know you could bring water from concrete, baby dats just how bad you are……..when I was worried bout not being pregnant yet. Dey came running to my side scores and scores of people at my door, phone ringing what was going on? So many noises…..Momma help me Momma help me I cried out to the heavens. Fires were burning everywhere smoke people glass Lord help me Daddy, Cotton please come back to me…..His blood still so thick in the concrete, they didn’t scrap him all up, I could see pieces of him in the concrete, and my body started to shake. They beat him to death heavy black flashlights in his skull, no cause, no reason….and wild fire spreaded through businesses, sirens glaring. Lord the sky opened up when they was found guilty, he didn’t go alone either. And one hung himself to escape prison time. Cotton told me I can and I can I can do it, Lord if water don’t spring from this here concrete I am gonna die, I’m gonna die. Finally the voices in my head was gone fucking Sun was jealous of Cotton now doing everything to get me to remember him. I noticed my fingers wet water started flowing from the concrete little dirty from being smothered under this concrete little red from the reflection of the moon hitting the red brick wall. Baby didn’t I tell you, you could do it and Lord when I heard his laugh I knew it was him, hard head makes for a soft ass, he said as he lifted me from my spot. Kissing my fingers what you didn’t believe me and I couldn’t catch my breath. Sun found me lying in the grass with heartbeats under my palm. Cotton don came home a gave me a son.
I knowed it is a boy cause Cotton told me so……………….
Exploring the impact of literary icon Flannery O'Connor's noted legacy on the cultural realities of modern-day America, the world, and a certain author.
Yankee Doodle Daddy is a historical Appalachian Family Saga. The story follows a mother's reckoning as she struggles to survive and keep her four daughters alive.
I know I can, I know I can feeling like that damn engine in that damn childhood story
