TEA LIKE  RIVER WATER

by Roger R. Angle

        I stir my tea now, and I am near

        73 years old, and I scoop up

        the swirling tea and it is the

        color of the Ninnescah River

        when I was a child. It is

        foolish now to remember my

        childhood so long ago.  

        I remember the water

        in the river by the

        cabin that is probably

        no longer there. I remember

        the sand and the trees like

        a jungle I ran through in my

        heavy boots. I remember

        they laced up high,

        I felt secure and strong

        in them. I would run through
        the jungle and climb the hill
        and run with the rabbits

        in the farmer’s field. I

        remember one time after

        a fire running through the

        stubble and the blackened

        earth and the black dust

        rising up, but I don’t

        run any more. I am

        about to be 73 next

        week, older than my father

        ever lived to be. He died at

        72 in a small apartment, shacked

        up with an 18-year-old girl. I

        met her once when they took me to

        lunch. He bought a Cadillac and

        a beautiful boat, a wooden

        Chris Craft, things he always

        wanted. Poor man, I feel sorry
        for him now. Too many years

        married to my angry mother,

        a nightmare for him

        and for me, too. Now

        I drink my tea and am

        glad to be living longer than he

        lived and happy I am not he,

        or anything like
        he used to be.  

July 28, 2011
Culver City, CA

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© Copyright 2011, Roger R. Angle