A Tale Of Two Sisters Poem by Almedia Knight-Oliver

Many years I've wished you happy birthdays or beginnings
Yet, there's something very special about this one-its a
milestone in your life and mine too.
Ora, are you aware that we've spent our entire
lives together and in proximity?

Now, let's trek back across the countless days we walked to
school singing "how much is that doggie in window" echoing the 50's
Ora, do you remember our double dates with Joe and Milton, with sap rising
in the tree, preparing buds to flower in spring, and two teens full of glee.

Okay, okay! I know you're tired Ora- and me too!
Let's slow our pace a tad because our feet feel and
look like Old dancing Dan's deformed hoofs.

Look over yonder at those pink roses in your garden, calling to mind
that budding day in May, when we boarded the train, carrying a suitcase
a piece, a shoe box filled with fried chicken that both lit into
before the train had barely left the station, and to a place that both
had never heard of.
I'd not long graduated high school; was fresh as a wild flower in May
and you had not finished high school yet.

I've since wondered what Momma was thinking-her reason long
gone and is dust- sending two tamed girls to a feral city to
live with a 21 years old sister with a single room, sharing one
kitchen and bathroom with a stranger, and taking turns to pee and eat!

Momma, what-in-the-world were you thinking, I asked myself
Were you enslaved by your own creation and needed somebody
to amend your guilt and or faults? So many years have past
But, I wonder still.

Even today, the thoughts of that long trip on the streamline
causes my heart to beat loudly because we left our boy friends
behind and rode a half day Friday; all day Saturday and a half
day Sunday arrived in Brooklyn NY!

Then waded through a sea of people and pushed and shoved our way
through Penn Station.Shoulders to shoulders our sister led us on
and our ashy feet out of the station, Sunday May 8th 1954.
Two jaws dropped, eyes bucked in wonder and awe as we stepped
onto 33rd street in New York City smack dab in the shadows
of gigantic and boundless buildings and the end of that life chapter.

The best was yet to come: a decade later, three sisters were increased
by my 2 little boys.Then later years, an older and younger brother migrated
but less than 2 decades, their lives ended tragically, leaving behind stories
to ponder still.
Lastly, our baby sister migrated and added to the family link.

Now, Ora, we've aged beyond three scores and ten, family increased and decreased
and will increase and decrease still...

Now we are four sisters and the remainder of nine are resting in the glow
of each one's sunset: laughing, crying, remembering, and remembering not,
and waiting for the going down of each others sun... and knowing nothing
is exterminated...death always leaves its residue for a new beginning...

February 28,2007