As a child of nine, I was profoundly moved one winter morning. The fleeting beauty of the sun was glistening like diamonds on ice coated branches. The sun had begun it’s rise behind the trees sending shards of brilliant light through the tree branches. It took my breath. I wanted to capture that image and feeling forever. FW
Awakening
We always went to Mamaw’s house
on Christmas morning.
aunts, uncles, cousins crowded into the kitchen,
aroma of homemade biscuits and fried country ham.
Pappy said that you’re not in the family
unless you eat sardines on Christmas morning;
much laughter.
On the back porch I saw the dipper,
frozen upright in the water bucket.
I poked holes in the ice with the curious fingers
of a nine year old.
Outside
shards of bright morning light sparkled
on the lacy ice coated branches.
I held my breath
in fear of disturbing this wonderful world,
this captured beauty that I witnessed.
Silence.
Branches tinkled and cracked like
musical instruments
as sun rays warmed the ice.
A rooster crowed.
Freezing, and drawing a breath
of frigid air and wood smoke,
I tried to taste the feeling.
My awakening.
I have seen nothing since as beautiful.
Shivering, I returned to the warm kitchen.
I was surprised that no one could tell
that I was changed.
Frances Wells, second prize, poetry the Henderson Community College Literary Magazine
Spring 1993
Laura Frances 1867
Some things that I own,
my great-grandmother owned before me;
her wide, worn wedding band
and her middle name.
When I knew her,
it was through a child’s eyes.
She baked pancake-sized sugar cookies,
and had a feather bed.
It was in that deep feather bed that I,
hearing lonesome train whistles,
sought the safe security of her back.
While visiting her during the summer,
she would take my cousins and I
on walks up near the old cemetery.
We would dig sassafras roots,
her favorite kind, for her snuff can.
I wish I could have known her
as a young girl, traveling
across the country in a covered wagon.
I treasure these things of hers,
descending into my care,
the wedding band,
the middle name,
these things that I own now,
that she owned then.
I wonder if she also owned before me
an independent nature,
days of fearing everything
including herself.
A creative mind, unfounded insecurities,
passion,
the need for human touch
and love?
Frances Wells, poetry the Henderson Community College Literary Magazine
Spring 1993
