When Sorrow comes to visit, he doesn’t take off his shoes. Dragging and tracking mud from outside to every room in the house. He doesn't even pretend to wipe his feet at the welcome mat before entering. With each visit, his clothes become shabbier and his hands filthier. He always announces and apologizes that he can’t stay for long, he has others to visit. I always suggest water, but he prefers tea. Taking longer to prepare and prolonging his stay. We always listen to Etta while the tea is being made. I’m not ever sure when he’ll leave, some visits are more extended than others. No matter how long the stay, you can always tell he was here. The longer he stays, the more dirt and mud build up on the floor. The more smudges and streaks upon the wall. Even long after he’s gone and I’ve polished the floorboards and purified the walls, there’s still stains that he left behind. Forget-me-nots proving he was once here. Before he goes, he'll turn to me and say I should be grateful I’ve only got to scrub mud from the floors and trail a rag against the walls. If he were to take off his shoes, it would be far more mess to clean.

I'm not from a small town where everyone knows everyone. Where we stop to smile, greet, and wave. I'm from the capital, where the roads are scarred and the pollution in the gray sky is terrorizing school children with asthma before they even learn their ABCs. I'm from the city with the most violence. Car break-ins, assaults, and murders. Where people spit on the sidewalk, where the homeless man sleeps at the bus stop. Where every year, the same politicians promise if we vote for them, they'll be the ones to change this hopeless city. Then they turn around and use our tax dollars to vacation in places I can't even pronounce. But, I learned to drive on those scarred roads. I paused and waited on the playground as my weezy friends got out their inhalers. And I cried as many of them inevitably moved away. I gathered with hundreds of others on my city streets to protest those same politicians and seen the homeless man from the bus stop awake from his slumber to cheer us on.

She shrieks and cries out

Loud weeps from both her and child

She looks down to smile

The years seem to fly

Soon the crawls turn into walks

Babble turns to talk

Getting dressed for school

All grown up, tie my own shoe

Look, I’m driving too!

Got my bachelor’s,

But I am no longer one

Found my honey bun

She shrieks and cries out

The years have come to an end

Same way they begin

The mornings spent at my grandparent’s house were special, simply because it was with them. I’d watch the sky fade from a radiant red to a basic blue. The same blue it always was when I looked up while running around outside. They were Christians, but in the yard, there were always wandering Jews. My grandmother’s favorite, she’d tend to them a little more carefully than she would the other flowers. I’d sit and watch Barney on the small TV in the backroom, he’d sing me songs about cleaning up and being kind. But my personal favorite PBS character was the vampire from Sesame Street. I always admired his fangs. For breakfast, My grandfather would slap jelly on some toast. My grandmother, Viola, always had an aroma of Elizabeth Taylor’s perfumes. I can’t quite explain it, but if sophistication had a scent, that would be it. She would braid my hair after breakfast. She wanted me to look presentable when I went outside to stomp on the lilacs in the neighbor’s yard. She’d always add little barrettes to my hair, shaped like flowers and butterflies. My brother would always yell that they looked like grapes holding onto my hair as I ran past him. Before the mornings were over, my grandpa would sit close to the window and peel a plum for us. Then we’d watch the sky fade from a basic blue back to a radiant red. They aren’t with me now, but the smell of Passion and the taste of plums always brings me back.