Self-Portrait - Barbara - 1970s - Post-New-Testament, Kinshasa

Self-Portrait - Barbara - 1970s - Post-New-Testament, Kinshasa

Between Don and the girls, typing and household,
the grapefruit mangoes guavas, floors fridge freezer,
filters kettles bottles and ice cubes, I am on the go.
The hours and days flap past. I daydream but quietly.
Between the newsletters and the class prep I keep myself
soft and brittle. I wait and I watch.
Where I am there are hard arguments and comfortable
silences. And a little deferential dickering.
My world is peanut skins, onionskin, the skin of my teeth
and the dry cracking skin of my bare furrowed heels.
We can't keep the linoleum floors swept dirtless. The bottoms
of my feet are black at the end of every day.
One day the girls will be grown, gone, I will be older
but when would I stop to mourn. Don will still be needing
helpmate listener typist shoulder lover friend and nurse.
I will be here.
I dance a lot, sing a lot, read whenever I can.
I listen for as long as I can, as I must. I listen slow
and I listen fast.
I see the dresses slips pants undies shirts nighties flap
on the line, we hustle
them in quick before the next rain comes,
Tata Ndelo and I. The next rain
always comes.
I read in the dark, in the light, in the bedroom, quick,
furtive, at the beauty salon downtown
under the big round space helmet.
I try to keep up. I try to stay awake.
Beside me Don is watching me, loving me, needing me, making me
beautiful. Strong.
Sometimes I get mad. I shout. Sometimes
he pushes me too far.
I love this life.
Every Sunday in a different pew I fall asleep for the sermon,
wake up for the hymns and the prayers.