My People

My People run.

My People try.

My People mostly fail.

They run from things that hurt them.

Shame is ever-present, from the running.

She is sitting next to me now.

There were Shame-less ones among My People

Who would only dance with Shame on occasion—

Dispensing with Her repeatedly, in pirouettes of terror.

But even the Shame-less ones would ultimately collapse 

In their dizzying wake.

Forever and always, She will be the last one standing.

Gramma Nettie ran once.

She tried all her life.

She generally didn't fail.

She planted, tended, and mended—walked and listened.

She raised chickens, sewed her own clothes—and plenty of mine.

She baked, cooked, presented, and preserved.

She dyed and curled her hair.

She saved every penny 

So I could try all the things she never could.

Shame didn’t thrust at Gramma’s ambition,

But just mocked, “You’re selfish, to only save yourself.”

After all, she’d run away from home,

Abandoning her siblings to the power

Of something empty and malevolent on the prairie.

Grampa Arnold ran, too,

And tinkered all his life—

Trying is too strong a word.

He ran to the Big City from Money Creek, Minnesota.

He tinkered in an auto shop, long enough

To tinker in a factory, long enough

To tinker in a vacuum shop, long enough

To retire to his garage—tinkering.

His only striving was scaling the ladies’ boarding house

So he could sneak Gramma Nettie out.

Grampa, too, was plagued with Shame;

She whispered, “You’re just an illiterate farm boy.”

After all, he’d traded rural togetherness for urban loneliness,

Choosing alcohol as a balm for his pain

Alongside his runaway brothers.

When Grampa finally gave up his bottle,

And Gramma finally put down her work,

It was too late…

They’d cultivated a Shame-less son, Bud.

They’d neglected a Shame-bound daughter, Barbara, too.

She became my soul-struck mother.

Grandmother Wilene ran wild.

A child of serial abandonment,

She tried and failed, miserably and multiply.

She secretly loved beautiful things,

Tickling ivories and typewriter keys for Hawaii’s military men,

Surviving her first marriage to one named August;

Enduring another—less dangerous, but loveless.

Both men dead, she surrendered half her body to a stroke

But kept playing one-armed piano.

Wilene was a vessel of overflowing Shame,

Who pestered, “You’re not good enough to keep.”

She kept running and playing until she died, 

Leaving pretty detritus in a nursing home bedroom—

Leis, paper fans, and photographs of a life she failed to dwell in.

Grandfather August never ran.

He was a Shame-less one, though he’d dance with her violently.

He tried and failed, but his soul died long before his body.

He dressed in the finest suits as his household wore rags.

He charmed the ladies outside his home and returned to it drunk,

With cruel, paternal orders for his sisters within.

He played with how hard he could make Shame spin,

Making his family watch Her pirouettes of terror.

He didn’t have the guts to hate himself.

How many secrets had August shared with Shame—

A Spurned Lover, lassoed and gagged?

He kept his conscience submerged with alcohol,

The bottle doing him in, viciously too late

To prevent his son learning the art of projection.

Wilene abandoned her son as she had been abandoned,

Transferring August’s cruelty to Donald, my father,

Who never had a chance, hearing,

"If ever you fail, Son, it's the darkies' fault.

You're better than them… And don't you forget it."

Dad did not.

Mom ran around.

Barbara failed to try much within her home,

Choosing the predictable beauty of math class

And later, line work at the pen factory.

Trying anything at home meant being seen,

And being seen meant her brother’s abuse.

Terror and home became synonymous,

So she ran around with boys who were only nice-at-first.

Dad was no exception.

Shame was Mom’s only companion,

Who coaxed, “Maybe you should end it.”

Barb tried so hard in the factory, 

But corporate greed meant no more factory,

So she ran inside herself and made a home there.

She failed to parent, failed to care for herself,

Failed to believe that she deserved better

Than a suffocating spouse whose long-deferred death

Left her in a decaying wreck of a house

With a soul-struck son… Her daughter was long-gone.

Dad knew how to run.

Donald tried and failed many times to be Shame-less;

Unlike his father, he couldn't spin her away for long.

He tried to be liked; to get respect,

But he was only taught how to fawn and fear.

He suffocated rage with buttercream cake and hot fudge sundaes.

His home became a worthless hulk of derelict projects.

His hope for riches became rubbish.

Spent lottery tickets littered the floor of every car.

Shame had ample time to poison his lonely soul.

She taunted, “No one respects or even likes you.”

Don endured a long life of crushed hope.

Family violence, Agent Orange, US-Army, Retired…

Civilian layoff, serial underemployment, disfiguring cancer.

His hope turned disappointment for Donald Junior;

He destroyed his only son with tough-love violence.

His hope turned estrangement for me;

He trapped his only daughter in dissociated dashes

Toward anything that looked like love.

I am taking off these running shoes;

All these sprints leave me tired.

My People’s trying has broken me;

Their failings have swamped my heart.

I’ve achieved—as if everything is okay.

I detached—as if I needed nothing.

But I wish more people knew how dearly I've failed.

I tell myself I’ve nothing more to do with Shame,

With her cruel words and tempting despair.

I tell myself I’ve ended her sway in the family line…

But wouldn't it be sweet and warm and grounding and lovely

To bask in a breezy light of significance

That doesn't depend on who I am not?

To rest and in a cool shade of worth 

Not gained by accomplishment?

To stand and sway in a legitimacy 

My People never allowed themselves to feel?

…To dwell in a home forged in dignity and kept in safety?

Perhaps I’ll keep trying and failing and trying again,

In My People’s familiar, careworn hope.

Perhaps I’ll convince Shame to rest forever

Or to run along, quietly carrying their bones.