serves up plates of fried chicken and fresh-baked blackberry pie. It also holds the wild imagination of a girl on a swing, her Ma’s arm curled like a question mark around her shoulders, a book shared between their laps.
Yes, a porch allows for grand laughter and raucous music, as well as countless hours for dithering away a rainy day unfit for anything other than rocking and reading, while the fierceness of clouds pass overhead.
I wish you could have sat on the porch with your MeeMaw as she rocked in her chair, holding a thin book to her breasts, swaying back and forth, as if holding that book and swaying would give her eyes something to think about other than their gathering blindness.
I wish you could have known her audacity.
I’ll never forget one day—a rain-promised summer day when the humidity hung over our shoulders like sacks of damp laundry and great thunderclouds filled our lungs with moisture and effort. Your MeeMaw insisted I sit with her on the porch to fan our faces and read her beloved Milton. Specifically, she wanted to hear his poem On His Blindness .
She sat plucking snap peas from a bowl, pinching off the stem end and pulling away each pod’s tough membrane with one swift movement. Ma’s cat (which she naturally named John Milton) lolled at her feet. I sat on the swing, a glass of lemonade sweating onto the floor at my feet, wishing for something, anything, other than John Milton’s old duddy poetry.
I remember your MeeMaw asking me to repeat the last line of the poem. “Read that last line again,” she said, her voice thick with clouds and coming rain.
“The last line?”
“Yes. Say the last line for me.”
“They also serve who only stand and wait . ”
“Read it again,” Ma said.
“Again?”
“Yes. Yes , Lillie Claire. Read it again.” Tears began to form in her eyes.
“They also serve who only stand and wait.”
Suddenly, she jumped upright from her chair, flinging the bowl of peas across the porch, causing John Milton the Cat to run off, squalling in displeasure. Her arms flailed in front of her, her blind eyes sprung wide open as if something bright and wild had exploded deep within them.
“I’m standin’ and waitin’,” she cried. “Oh, dear sweet baby Lord Jesus, I’m standin’ and waitin’!”
Your dear MeeMaw pleaded for healing and redemption, the strength of her voice informing heaven that she would not accept her fate with a simple, shrugging sigh. Her moment of truth was dressed in the last line of a Milton sonnet and she cried to God to fix her. She smacked at her eyes with still-young hands wilted from years of scrubbing floors and making pies.
“Jesus, come put your healing mud on these eyes and make them see again,” she cried out. “I’m standin’ and waitin’ for you. Can’t you see me, Jesus? Here I am. I’m right here! Standin’ and waitin’. Standin’ and wait—”
Oh, I can’t go on. I only know that what happens on a Southern woman’s porch is sometimes magical and sometimes horrid. But whatever occurs, it must be dealt with sensitively, courteously—and always with a fluttering fan in one’s hand. Please try to remember that one thing if you should ever have a porch where you can sit, sipping lemonade, while allowing your gaze to wander over poetry that will scare the living daylights from your soul.
If you ever have a porch, do make sure you hold a proper fan.
Be brave,
Love, Mother
P. S. I’m still selecting words for my sonnet for you. It’s difficult, but thanks to the heavenly stars, you love me in spite of my recent shortcomings.
I fold the letter and put it back in the box. I had hoped to find a different piece, a thing of cedar-scented comfort rather than a reminder of heat-sodden lungs and blind eyes and the hell of John Milton. I consider pulling a different letter, something that might make me laugh, but instead close the box and find what contentment there is in the simple mystery of chance.
Somewhere in
Yes, a porch allows for grand laughter and raucous music, as well as countless hours for dithering away a rainy day unfit for anything other than rocking and reading, while the fierceness of clouds pass overhead.
I wish you could have sat on the porch with your MeeMaw as she rocked in her chair, holding a thin book to her breasts, swaying back and forth, as if holding that book and swaying would give her eyes something to think about other than their gathering blindness.
I wish you could have known her audacity.
I’ll never forget one day—a rain-promised summer day when the humidity hung over our shoulders like sacks of damp laundry and great thunderclouds filled our lungs with moisture and effort. Your MeeMaw insisted I sit with her on the porch to fan our faces and read her beloved Milton. Specifically, she wanted to hear his poem On His Blindness .
She sat plucking snap peas from a bowl, pinching off the stem end and pulling away each pod’s tough membrane with one swift movement. Ma’s cat (which she naturally named John Milton) lolled at her feet. I sat on the swing, a glass of lemonade sweating onto the floor at my feet, wishing for something, anything, other than John Milton’s old duddy poetry.
I remember your MeeMaw asking me to repeat the last line of the poem. “Read that last line again,” she said, her voice thick with clouds and coming rain.
“The last line?”
“Yes. Say the last line for me.”
“They also serve who only stand and wait . ”
“Read it again,” Ma said.
“Again?”
“Yes. Yes , Lillie Claire. Read it again.” Tears began to form in her eyes.
“They also serve who only stand and wait.”
Suddenly, she jumped upright from her chair, flinging the bowl of peas across the porch, causing John Milton the Cat to run off, squalling in displeasure. Her arms flailed in front of her, her blind eyes sprung wide open as if something bright and wild had exploded deep within them.
“I’m standin’ and waitin’,” she cried. “Oh, dear sweet baby Lord Jesus, I’m standin’ and waitin’!”
Your dear MeeMaw pleaded for healing and redemption, the strength of her voice informing heaven that she would not accept her fate with a simple, shrugging sigh. Her moment of truth was dressed in the last line of a Milton sonnet and she cried to God to fix her. She smacked at her eyes with still-young hands wilted from years of scrubbing floors and making pies.
“Jesus, come put your healing mud on these eyes and make them see again,” she cried out. “I’m standin’ and waitin’ for you. Can’t you see me, Jesus? Here I am. I’m right here! Standin’ and waitin’. Standin’ and wait—”
Oh, I can’t go on. I only know that what happens on a Southern woman’s porch is sometimes magical and sometimes horrid. But whatever occurs, it must be dealt with sensitively, courteously—and always with a fluttering fan in one’s hand. Please try to remember that one thing if you should ever have a porch where you can sit, sipping lemonade, while allowing your gaze to wander over poetry that will scare the living daylights from your soul.
If you ever have a porch, do make sure you hold a proper fan.
Be brave,
Love, Mother
P. S. I’m still selecting words for my sonnet for you. It’s difficult, but thanks to the heavenly stars, you love me in spite of my recent shortcomings.
I fold the letter and put it back in the box. I had hoped to find a different piece, a thing of cedar-scented comfort rather than a reminder of heat-sodden lungs and blind eyes and the hell of John Milton. I consider pulling a different letter, something that might make me laugh, but instead close the box and find what contentment there is in the simple mystery of chance.
Somewhere in
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