I Begin to Write My Memoir on the Sidewalk with Kids’ Chalk
It just feels right.
I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk. Someone left a box on the grass, and it just feels right. I begin to write my childhood inside the rickety hopscotch squares, willing windows for glimpses of roller skates, dislocated shoulders, and being picked last.
I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk. Someone washed the hopscotch and my childhood clean way. It might have been the rain. It’s just as well. I begin to write my teen years down the driveway, on a raked angle, a rough surface for Daddy’s yelling, my crying, and not being asked to dance. I hope it rains again.
I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with kids’ chalk. Someone has erased away my teens. It might have been the cars coming home from work, going out again to shop. Tires can do that if there’s enough of them. It’s just as well.
I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk with big letters this time. Letters that spell marching, sitting in, skipping classes with my teachers, making love, not war. People walk by stepping carefully around my anger. A dog sniffs, pees, moves on.
I begin to write my memoir on the sidewalk in cursive, which is faster, but harder to read. Somehow my thirties fit between the…
