Cassie Lee

 by Lori Lasseter Hamilton

My pen runs dry as I write for you.

Letters fade, ink invisible from blue.

I poem on paper like Grandma sewed quilts,

mismatched patches jumbled together.

You were Momommy to me.

My other grandmother, I simply called Grandma.

I wonder if your mother hollered “Cassie Lee!”

as you played in the dirt in denim overalls.

In this photo you pose on a dirt road,

wearing a dress with a bow, a pleated hem,

and belt with rhinestone buckle,

fancy in the dirt.

The country road you stand on

is dusty as the flour you used

to make biscuits Sunday mornings,

when I’d wake up for church

after spending the night with Papa and you.

I’d sit beside you on the First Baptist pew

as Mom and Dad sang in the choir loft.

You’d pinch my arm or give me a Certs,

depending on whether I squirmed or sat as still

as your body in a hospital bed

when a tumor overtook your brain.

I bought a Whitman’s Sampler box from the gift shop,

but you, confused, asked me to cut you a piece of that cake.

You fell into a coma when I went back to my dorm room.

I got the call from Mom one December that you were gone.

I threw up into a washcloth in the living room back home.

I only got to spend 21 years with you.

Every day I adore you

with a short bob, unsmiling,

as you stand in the dust on a Gadsden road

in your glamorous dress with rhinestone belt and bow.

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