North End Blues

A few weeks back I made a trip to my hometown to see a good friend of mine. It's been years since I drove through my old neighborhood, and time has not helped the memories I carry of it.



North End Blues


Time is a hula hoop
around my waist, swirling
faster with each loop.
On the street where once I lived
Elvis now impersonates himself,
croons "Cold Kentucky Rain,"
and smells of homelessness.
I see the notes of his song slip down
a dirty white shirt, catch in the ragged
edges of his bell-bottoms.
Down the block Etta James
lingers from a radio,
slows the spinning world,
her sorrow leaking out a torn
screen door in a dissonant
duet with the King on the corner.
Fledgling years turn and slide
down the alley, their soprano shrieks
bounce between buildings, a ghost
game of hide and seek once played
among grand dames of innocence
and peppermint, now houses without heart.
I scale the walls of a Four Square,
stare into my bedroom but a woman,
not my mother, glares back,
refuses to recognize me. Someday
the same will happen to her,
no keepsake view. The years change
everything but me, and la dolce vita
melts away. At least the mourning dove
in the old maple tree nods a greeting.
Elvis, Etta, and the bird in three part harmony.



Marilyn Aschoff Mellor