So school....

Some days I am overwhelmed, but this week I am feeling pretty good. Last blog's discussion of the "not my best" English paper ever... wasn't so bad (An A - yeah). She appears to be a more of a "are you getting it?" teacher. As in, are you getting what you are reading? Apparently, I am.

Last assignment - I earned a perfect A. Therefore, I am sharing it with you. The thought was to read a 19th century poem by a puritan woman and understand her pain and put yourself there. Your home has burned to the ground... so what has become of you...?

Here is mine... you may not enjoy it, but my Professor did and that is enough for me.

“Not the Keepsake or the Space”
by Sharra Blair-Kucera

The skeletal remains of a Gibson guitar stand
A clay impression of one’s tiny hand
Parts of the music and the muse
Floodgates opened the heart abused

Fragments of pictures and memories
Births, celebrations, and family histories
Tormented and tattered, now ashes sake
Begging tomorrow from a dream to wake

Wet remains of papers lay scattered about
A lifetime devoted to a home throughout
Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter Egg Hunts and Halloween
Now nothing left, but recollections of these

Pap’s violin, Big Daddy’s guitar
Mamaw’s landscapes and Granmudi’s jars
Papa’s oldest cowboy hat
Momma’s china and all of that

Grandma’s picture of three states from her front porch
All in flames and what is left - scorched
No more laughter to be had at our table of seven
Granmudi bought it when my Mom was only eleven

Years have been spent around that table for many
Now charred wood and ash – before a chair for any
Water drips off the edges of a family’s dream
Like tears of the heart they glisten and glean

No more birthday parties or bar-b-q’s
No more “honey, I’m home” or “Darlin, what’s new?”
The old door you could hear slam down the block
No more does it stand – nothing to lock
 

The jewelry box that a ring came in
Gone quickly but the ring remains on his hand
So much lost that cannot be recovered
Momma’s old quilts will never again cover

Nevertheless, there are small things here and there
A picture blown free from the blackened despair
A ring in the ashes, a plate in the soot
Bits and pieces of a past – our only loot

We walked out of the ash, the soot, and the black
To realize what we have - built from our past
Strength, honor, and love - none could compare
From the ashes we rise up and the better we fair

Hold your loved ones dearly
Not the objects – those replace
In the end, the lives are precious
Not the keepsakes or the space