Summer in Mississippi

Photo by my Mom of my Grandmother Nana and my brother Tim fishing in Mississippi about 1957.

Summer in Mississippi

Pa and Nana’s house in summer

Hot and humid, no place cool.

Even darkness of night

Brings no relief, purple clouds

Fierce thunder and lightening

In the afternoons, sheets

Of rain, singing cicadas, no relief.  

In Pa’s bait shop a shadowy oven,

With the crickets and minnows,

Seining before dawn, the black

Water moccasins. Fishing with bamboo polls.

Birdie working in the kitchen, baked cream corn,

Fried eggplant, summer squash

All from the garden  standing like a dense

Thicket. Darkened parlor rarely used,

White hand-made doilies,

Wooden swing on the porch

Under pecan trees.

Hot and humid everywhere.