How Does a Chick Get Service in a Joint Like This? Canto 2

CANTO 2   August 24, 2011

Everybody has a story

It’s my job as a writer to tell mine

So that you remember yours

My father told me that if I wanted

To do better than him

I was spitting in his face.

My sister chose to be a nurse

Which he considered woman’s work

And no insult to his driving a bus.

My mother was forced to go to work

When we reached Cleveland.

She was furious at my father’s failure

And vowed that she would never

Do another day’s housework

And told me it was up to me.

Since I was crazy and my sister

Had a normal life.

For some peculiar reason

I chose to major in business.

I don’t know why.

We started out commuting to college

My father would go no further in debt

For a couple of girls.

Business majors had to take English

Like every other poor slob.

My English teacher listened to me read an essay

And ordered me out of business, saying

“You’re a writer.”

So, I did because I was.

Since fourteen when I found

That I loved to read and view plays.

Just before Junior Year,

My mother said the magic words

“You’re so crazy you might as well accept the fact

That the only thing you’ll ever do is stay home

And take care of me.” And I knew I had to run.

My parents had made me start paying for my clothes at 16

So all the summer jobs and part time work

Got me enough money to pay the room and board at

Ohio University at the furthest southern end of the state.

Southarhn Ohhai, y’all

I became a Playwrighting major

As I had written plays since I was fourteen

And Lorraine Hansberry died, leaving

It up to me to carry the load.

Later shrinks would call me a clever girl for hearing

What she was really saying and planning.

That I had been raised to take care

Of a depressed and angry women.

Just like every man I would ever love.