Remembering Childhood Poem by RoseAnn V. Shawiak

Remembering Bound Brook, New Jersey, my very own Mayberry, R.F.D.
A small town bordered by brooks - a beautiful place to live and grow.
Living with my Grandmother, parents, Aunts and Uncles we had a happy time together.
Grandma was from Mierto, Sicily and spoke broken English.
When I was one she became an American citizen and forbid speaking Italian any more and I struggled at that young age to learn English.
When starting school, I wouldn't talk and had a hard time remembering what I read because of the language barrier.
Having a difficult time trying to think and and revert from Sicilian to English.
Suddenly in fifth grade that miraculously turned around and I developed a photographic memory to go along with my thinking in colorful pictures - finally combining in my mind I received the best of both worlds.
Reading my way through the grade school library, I read all the classics, Dickens, Mark Twain, O'Henry, etc.
Also reading classics from our church library, I was fascinated with Dark Night Of The Soul, That Man Is You, Thomas Merton and every book I could obtain.
Absorbing every word, collecting thoughts and blending them all in my mind, a mystical call awaiting me as I grew and started writing poetry when eleven.