our school scored higher than the
whole state on achievement tests and
I scored top of eighth grade.
Ma nodded.
“I knew you could.”
That’s all she said.
She was proud,
I could tell.
But she didn’t
coo like Mad Dog’s ma. Or
go on
like Mrs. Killian used to do.
Daddy says,
“That’s not your ma’s way.”
But I wish it was.
I wish she’d give me a little more to hold on to than
“I knew you could.”
Instead she makes me feel like she’s just
taking me in like I was
so much flannel dry on the line.
March 1934