What I have put in my journal is true.
There is no fiction inside me.
Only my dreams flounder in their stories.
When I speak of trains,
they passed my window as a child.
Our house was thirty feet from tracks.
I grew up with the body odor of machines,
guttural voices.
Coal from boxcars on iron lanes.
The dank divinity of coal.
Star stones that would glow in our stove
And darken the windows with soot.
I grew up with skiffs and sailboats,
sailing above the chop of Sandusky Bay.
The quick vibration of a boat
in love with the wind.
I grew up trailing my fingers in the water.
Looking into murky corneas of light,
gazing back at my eyes.
I grew up with gravel, verbal wars,
sunflowers that leaned over me
like old men.
I grew up with broken shoelaces,
walls that scampered with mice,
tea kettles bubbling above the fire,
scarlet tea steaming in the pot,
tea for breakfast, every hour of the day.
I grew up on moldy words in books.
I explored without understanding the words,
that lit up like lamps as I learned them.
My childhood was poor,
violent,
and sad,
and beautiful, still
waking me at night,
to see if I am happy.
I am.