echoes of appalachia

Kerosene

The kerosene heater is warm

A soft orange glow flickers silhouettes on walls

Beckoning me close, radiating comfort

A familiar and strangely sweet smell

This new home was old and brittle

Much work needed to be done

Heat came mainly by warm glow of fire

The arrival of winter, kerosene sparks again

A child in blissful ignorance

I danced in the incandescent glow

Wrapped in the bulk of a blanket

I lie as close as courage could muster

My gaze floats along the heaters warning label

Drifting away into youthful dreams

I awake to a dizzy stir and pounding head

At the time I never understood why

Screen Doors

The screen door creaks open in cold winter

Carrying groceries through it, repeatedly

“I’m not paying to heat the outside” I hear distant

She stands idly while I squabble back and forth

Defiance leaves the body, I hurry to be done

The cold bites through gloves as I work

Shovels and salt scratch still time endlessly

The screen door screeches a scream in vacant air

“There better be no snow when you’re done”

And I know you mean it

The morning air is sharp and dry

The screen door shuts closed with a loud whack

“I know you’re faking it, you better be on that bus”

I stumble through snow with a cloudy head

Later, a nurse sends me home

What would it take to only listen

To remove the walls of a Matriarchs castle

To tear down the screen and see with lucidity

We viewed each other through screen doors

Two different worlds away

Oh, Appalachia

An old door frame silhouettes

The front porch of an ancient home

Duplexes project a golden era long past

Black soot collects upon their windowsills

Like the snow of a cold, harsh winter

No apple pie waits for you there

Instead, the aroma of burning rubber wafts

The bent road sign, a pothole the cause

Roads abandoned like families who grew here

At the dinner table, ideology is served

Gods are made of men

Carelessly they pack up industry

A region left jobless overnight

The hills rise up like bars of a cage

Trapping those left behind

Oh, Appalachia

A town in a coma, sleeping quietly

Rust and soot take over gradually

It continues to collect slowly

As the residents dream of days long past

Sinister

In this land where I was born

Something cold and sinister is brewing

Hearts of black like lungs of ancestors

Generations of snuffed out kindness

A passing street, a dirty look

“Mind your own business” the clerk whispers

Smiles less common than skill games

Paychecks disappear like hopes for a better life

The town known only for destruction

In a land known for the much of the same

Yet both have affected the people here

How lucky am I to have escaped this fate

My home in which I feel least welcome

I pay for my gas and walk away

Flags decorate the streets with abundance

Pride for that which has given them nothing

Railroad Street

The exit of 219 brings about strong feeling

A theme song of home like trumpets of surrender

Although I live far, still in-between

Emotions flow like creeks and tunnels

Following along the view, Railroad Street

Down the sulfur crick and through the valley

A scenery so grey, meant to be beautiful

I see childhood through landscape

Packed bags and an emptied room

Leaving my hometown, hoping never return

I saw only hate in a land of darkness

Distanced myself and swore off culture

I grew and changed, my eyes now shifted

From the scowl of hatred to the soft of sadness

Reasons for which hate has fostered

People whose struggle was never ending

Found myself in songs of ancestors

Complicated stirrings of heritage

I see you now with clarity

For I am coming home

mulligan

Food is the essence of culture

The food of Appalachia no exception

Hard times forced about new recipes

Big families needing to be fed

Currency in the form of Coal Scrip

Struggles create stories and warm meals

Oatmeal sat out overnight on the radiator

The childhood joy of sugar toast

Simplicity in melted butter and egg noodles

But none other more loved than Mulligan

A Miner’s Stew hearty and cheap

Meat, Potatoes, and Onion was all it was

Served with store bought italian bread

Generations later, the whole family still gathers

News of Nana’s Mulligan brings them in dozens

Laughter shared over a large boiling pot

Tales of coal times passed on

Of swimming in sulfur creeks

Of selling leftover scrap for pennies

Of exploring railroads and tunnels

Of all the hard times and the good

kingdom of rust

The Appalachian mountains

Turn orange and red

Much like the factories

In this kingdom of rust

The Appalachian rivers

Run brown and yellow

Much like the sulfur

In this kingdom of rust

The Appalachian towns

Sit white and gray

Much like the tunnels

In this kingdom of rust

The Appalachian people

Are black and blue

Much like the region

In this kingdom of rust