Mammy never owned a dryer,
She would always use the fire
To dry clean clothes for her eight kids,
Who played in pants as if on stilts,
Wore Goodwill shirts like cardboard fibre.
We'd no money for laundromats,
Immigrants don't waste like that;
We made the move from Ireland,
Turned our backs, washed our hands;
Chose Sarnia to make our home.

Yes, Mammy washed our clothes with stones;
She'd string lines from wall to wall,
And draped our patchwork overalls.
In autumn, winter and early spring,
Our house was strung with clothes line string;
Socks dropped on chairs near heating vents,
Every room had ***** like tents.

One  day Daddy stretched a line
From our back porch
To the farthest pine.
Looped the wire on a tubeless rim,
Secured the ends with linchpins.
Mammy was so pleased with him.

We four saw what he'd done,
He'd made a ride for his sons.
We were gliding like clothes drying,
Riding down the yard.
Flapping, laughing, having fun,
Like human clothes under the sun;
We , however, were burdensome,
The line gave up, and we fell hard.

On blustery days when sheets are snapping,
I recall the clothes line cracking,
Our fall from grace had nothing lacking.
Oh, I remember he chastised,
But I also remember
Daddy's eyes,
And how they smiled
When he told his friends
He hung his sons
Out to dry.

On Sunday, my S.O. and I
Drove to see Chorus Line
At the Stratford Festival.
A matinee. Beautiful day.
We left the Refineries of Sarnia
For fine entertainment.
The Avon flows gently
Buoying white swans gracefully.
Blah... blah... blah.
All very real.
You can see why it's called, Stratford;
There could be no other name.
A good choice.
Best Shakespearean Festival in N.A.
She explained all this to me on the drive.
If contrary people suffer
From low self-esteem, I didn't help
The situation.
As we drove through rich, green farmland,
Grazing cattle.
She asked why some barns
Have ramps leading to the barn doors.
Well, says I,
The farmers, because of the economy,
Have to sell their livestock in parts,
So the ramps give easy access for the animals
Back to their stalls.
Huh, said S.O.
That's so thoughtful!
Timing is everything.
Sincerity in voice, critical.
Hurry on to a new topic.

Someday, for sure, she'll tell someone, somewhere
About the considerate farmer.
She will.
Timing.
Like the kick line.
Like a *punch line.

On the ticket for mayor of Sarnia,
Was a sixties bloke, one Wills Rawana;
But the anti-*** vote,
With good conscience can't support,
A politico called Mayor Rawana.

Flying on my Shadow,
Enjoying the ride,
I passed a hillside
With stones, spelling out:
Sarnia Nudist Camp
In bright white letters,
Legible from a distance.

Did the frost push them up
Through the earthly womb
To birth this message
For the reading pleasure of passers-by?

Did the camp director create
This hillside billboard?

I've heard, at nightime, the stones
Gleam under a constant moon
That radiates above a notion of chance.

I paid a visit to Byron.
He was distressed about
His sixteen year old son.
A smart lad.
Can't sign his name for his driver's license.
     He was never taught cursive writing, By.
I lamented with him.
The blue book, half the size of standard,
With the two solid blue lines,
Divided by a-broken-red-line.
We began with dull HB pencils,
So not to tear the pages.
By Grade Five, we had fountain pens.
Pages and pages...of loops, sticks, slanted at the correct angle,
Through the red line and all the way to blue,
Or (and this took serious concentration),
Only three-quarters the way,
Up, and/or down to the lower red.
Pages of o's, p's, q's, x's, z's.
Every letter its own uniqueness.
Then joining them like a chain gang:
Creating words that dug, turned over and spread out.
Any and all words making sense of the world,
In sequence, patterns and sound.
Such power.
Letters to distant Grandparents,
Valentines, notes.
Hieroglyphics.

Your Signature.

Francie Lynch
246 Devine St., S.,
Sarnia,
Ontario.
Canada
North America
Western Hemisphere
The World
The Solar System
The Milky Way
The Universe

I was one with infinity and creation.
In ink. Real ink,
By age 10.

The Miss, Misters and Mrs.,
And the St. Joseph's Sisters,
Made me a Bluejay,
Jay- jaying and soaring
Over Wrens and Robins
Below in five rows.
Teeth marks on Ticondarogas,
Initialed pink rubbers,
Toothpicks and fingers
Solved all those problems.

Sister Lucille showed me Sarnia
On the Neilson Wall Map,
With the Malted Milk,
Crispy Crunch bars staring back.
They looked too delicious,
Her reprimand was contritious,
I'm doing time during recess,
Ninety minutes til lunch.

We stood in a crooked line,
Like a snake, to get marked,
With her drawer a crack open
We'd get a peek at her strap.
Black or red, correctively cold;
Sister Roseangela, we'd heard,
Cried, Quid Pro Quo.

We had football baseball,
And hockey dreams,
Volleyball, basketball,
And funeral teams;
Field Days, Holy Days,
Days needed at home;
Teachers were coaches,
With little time to complain;
But the kids back then
Just weren't the same.
There were skirmishes, fouls,
Strike outs and time outs;
We were sliced white bread,
No rye or whole grain.

We'd march double file
Once a week to the Church,
To genuflect and reflect
At the Stations and Cross.
To confess, get redress,
Display penitent remorse,
Though keeping a secret
From the Confessional box,
A comfort and curse.

Their objective succeeded,
The lessons went deep;
Using the three Rs,
The ABCs, 1, 2, 3s,
To impart and ingraine
How to carry one's cross.

I remember by name
The Miss,  Misters and Mrs.
And St. Joseph's Sisters
Who gave their all,
Each day, and always.
They've gone or retired,
But recalled in tranquility
For the life-lessons I admire.

Open letter to my children

Love, memories and family.

What we are going through was not something we wanted.
What we are going through is not something we can change.
What we can do is remember and move forward, together.
It is only by honoring what is gone that we can love the present.
We are together now but separate.

I will always remember the times we travelled together as a family.
The Istanbul hotel, the crazy plane ride on ****** Island, Whitney Manor,
Kyrgyzstan, Disney World, and Sarnia.
Looking back – that is a weird mix of places!
We did it is as a family and in love.

To my soon to be ex, I will always seek to remember our times together
Richmond, Amish country, Eastern Shore, the Lake District and the journey through parenthood.
I am sorry that you decided that love was gone and not worth saving.
I looked deep into the abyss in a life without you and came out with a bare and raw soul to start over.  
While I will never understand, fare well. I forgive you and wish you well.

My dears, please remember the love we had and don’t ever give up on it.
What we are going through will not change the past.
The past is a nice place to visit but oh, the places we will go.
What we are going through does not prevent the future.
Our future means being here and now.

Please remember that there was love in our family.
Please know that there always will be love in our family
Please believe in a kind of love that never dies
The love of your parents was ended but know this does not always happen
Please know that love is and can be all you need.

Remember the examples of lifetime love.
Both of your grandparents loved each other their whole lives
Love is hard, it is rewarding, it can do things you never thought.
Please think of how you love your sister – you cannot stop that.
Please know that there is real love in the world for you.

Again, what we are going through we did not choose.
What we had will not change.
We have a wide and big family of love
We will have great and wonderful things
What we will always have is love.

I attended a house concert last night. I go to about three a year. The hardest working musicians in the business. The fella last night was from Newfoudland. Drove to Victoria, then to Sarnia, my hometown. Drove thirty-three hours from Regina... in one day. Old and new friends were present, all of us living the middle-class life.
He sang a song, Money Can't Make You Happy.
That's not a truism. It's an opinion. It sounds... eh...
Go for a walk, but you need to cover your feet.
Watch the tele, you need a room.
Have some We time; Your place or mine?
We relish our North American Middle-Class Life.
It's true... money can't make you happy,
But I'd be unhappy without it... some of it.
Later, as I was getting in my Kia,
The Newfoundlander was getting into his Volvo,
With happy tail-lights.

Here is my home town.
I'm lucky to live here,
To have grown here
With all our familiar streets and sights;
The houses where we lived together,
The homes of my childhood friends;
Our schools, churches and local attractions
Are mostly here.
The comings and goings of the locals
Are documented in The Observer.
Familiar and strange.

Today I see a city of cards and cardboard cut-outs.
Sarnia is a museum display of life
In the 21st century I study from this side
Of the display case.
In time, the partition separating us will dissolve
Into a pile of shifting sand about our feet.