One day when I was not yet six
I found in the early morning
A baby doll lying lost upon my porch.
I wondered who could have left it there
So naked and alone
A chocolate brown round chubby baby doll,
Just the right size for my child hands.
I scooped it up fast from the cold, cold stone
And warmed it in my arms.
Carrying it inside, I took clothes from my other dolls
To make my new child feel at home.
I smoothed my hands over her tight black curls
And laid my cheek against the smooth dark rose of hers.
I looked with love into her shining eyes
And smiled my heart at her pink baby smile.
My childhood friends, though, thought my baby doll strange
With her dark skin:
They’d never seen brown baby dolls.
I began to wonder why I had never seen
Another sweet brown baby doll
Though I looked in every toy display
Of every store I knew.
So, I asked my mama why my baby doll was brown.
And my mama told me
There were mamas and papas
Who were darkly brown
And their babies were deep brown, too, which was why
My orphan baby was so warmly chocolate brown.
I did not really understand at all,
But I loved my orphan child of brown
Until I grew too old for dolls.
It was then I learned
There were people afraid of brown,
Who hated Black,
And that white could be an ugly word.
It was then I first knew that I was White.
#RaceAwareness #Childhood #DollsandChildhood
Splinters for January 2021
WINTER BEGINS
Though squirrels still scurry for food,
The snowflakes fill all the sky
And blanket all the earth below.
The trees have shed their leaves to sleep
While the flowers have drifted to earth.
Now, as I sit here, quietly sipping tea,
A soft firelight warms every nook.
Nightfall now always comes too soon
Bringing frost to decorate the scene.
A mournful cry echoes from the wild.
While animals huddle together for warmth,
My house is snug from wintry blasts.
The winds may shriek and howl in icy blast.s
I will be sitting in my little old house
Munching walnuts dipped in maple sugar.
Winter is the season in which to relax,
To retreat for a time, to genuflect,
And get ready for the hurly-burly
Of Spring’s furious renewal of life.
#WinterandPoetry #NatureandPoetry
ORPHAN CHILD
One day when I was not yet six
I found in the early morning
A baby doll lying lost upon my porch.
I wondered who could have left it there
So naked and alone
A chocolate brown round chubby baby doll,
Just the right size for my child hands.
I scooped it up fast from the cold, cold stone
And warmed it in my arms.
Carrying it inside, I took clothes from my other dolls
To make my new child feel at home.
I smoothed my hands over her tight black curls
And laid my cheek against the smooth dark rose of hers.
I looked with love into her shining eyes
And smiled my heart at her pink baby smile.
My childhood friends, though, thought my baby doll strange
With her dark skin:
They’d never seen brown baby dolls.
I began to wonder why I had never seen
Another sweet brown baby doll
Though I looked in every toy display
Of every store I knew.
So, I asked my mama why my baby doll was brown.
And my mama told me
There were mamas and papas
Who were darkly brown
And their babies were deep brown, too, which was why
My orphan baby was so warmly chocolate brown.
I did not really understand at all,
But I loved my orphan child of brown
Until I grew too old for dolls.
It was then I learned
There were people afraid of brown,
Who hated Black,
And that white could be an ugly word.
It was then I first knew that I was White.
#RaceAwareness #Childhood #DollsandChildhood
QUIET WORLD OF WINTER
Whisper soft
. Snow covers
. sky
. hill
. field
. road
. Snow frosts
. tree
. path
. windowsill
Whisper soft
. white dream
. covers all
#WinterandPoetry #SnowPoetry
Author’s Notes
GLASS RAIN—the poetry by Margaret Roxby
“QUIET WORLD OF WINTER”. In the original version “whisper soft” was spelled as one word, not two.
REFRACTIONS
“WINTER BEGINS” by Robert Roxby. The first thirty years of Robert’s life was spent in states where winter snow was a regular occurrence. He speaks of drinking tea in this poem, but when he lived in the East, it would have been coffee. Tea was the doctor ordered beverage in his old age when this poem was written.
THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS—the poetry of Kathleen Roxby
“ORPHAN CHILD”, newly edited for this site was published originally as a memoir poem. The author has since learned that around the time of finding her orphan doll, her dad had promoted a Negro(the term in use at the time) on his team for his excellence, passing over a white man whose work was subpar. This was protested by the white worker. Robert told him, “When your work is the equal to his, I will promote you as well.” The author now believes the doll was thrown in the hope of breaking a picture window at the front of the house to send a warning to Robert. The doll likely came from the Los Angeles factory for Ideal Toys, a local manufacturer which distributed one such doll until 1953.
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
Readers who write in response to one of the prompts listed each month in Splintered Glass, may see their work presented here on the last week of that month. Though poems are preferred, short prose work will also be considered for publication.
Guidelines for submission:
Splinters for January 2021
WHEN A WINTER WIND SWEEPS ICE CRYSTALS THROUGH THE PASS, YOU WILL HEAR THE HOWL OF THE SCAVENGERS
They came through our home
Like animals
Come searching for food
When Winter has closed
The mountain passes.
Clumsy with a desperate need,
They came to steal our Spring.
But once returned
To their ice cavern home,
They found only the fragile petals
Of frozen flowers in their hands.
Again, and again they came.
And their angry hunger
Slashed at our contentment
Threatening the serenity
Of our Spring.
Till at last, they were exhausted,
Broken by the hopeless struggle
To bring Spring to the Winter
Land they called home.
Still they came—
To briefly know the warmth
Of a borrowed sun
In an alien land of Spring.
#DysfunctionalFamilies #ChildhoodandPoetry #SpringandWinter
THESE UNFORGOTTEN DREAMS
In attic silence
The dusty dreams sleep
Shrouded in shadowed whisperings.
Webbed-in, remote and dignified,
These unforgotten once sparkled
In the young burnished sun
Like golden tambourines.
Released from veiled slumber,
Brought into today,
Would they be luster-lost
And songless now?
Ah, well, and even so,
Let the magician-voiced vendor
Call his striking wares
Sharp as polished silver:
. New dreams, new dreams,
. New dreams for old
No one will lean from this unshuttered window
To make the trade, for then
The Aladdin heart might break.
#DreamsandMemory #AladdinandPoetry
TO BE OR NOT TO BE
At every New Year we begin to measure our lives. We consider the condition in which we have existed and the one we wish to be ours. It is appropriate therefore that today’s subject is the English word series used when we talk about our existence, the verb “be”.
I suspect that the English are not alone in making a hash of talking about existence. I know the verb forms in French and Spanish are labeled “irregular”. Well, the English, not to be outdone, have made theirs both simpler and very much more complicated.
We start with “be”, but the first use we make of this verb is to talk about ourselves, “I am.” Where did this A come from and what happened to the B? It continues in a sort of pattern to “You are.” Good, we are sticking with A, forget about that original B. Another human shows up and we continue with “We are”. Even when more humans arrive, we continue with “They are.” English is looking not so irregular after all.
But, oh no, something not human arrives and “It is.” How did we get to I? Maybe we plan to use all the vowels (a, e, i, o, u)?*
Not true. Start talking about conditions yesterday and suddenly you get “I/it was” and “We/you/they were.” W? How did W turn up? But, once again, English isn’t fussy. It settles for just two versions.
That’s what it looks like, until we start speculating about things, planning for or examining possible “what ifs” and the simple “Be” cannot cope on its own. It has to borrow other verbs: has/had/have, can/could, will/would, shall/should. These we call “helping” verbs.
English is not alone in this. Other languages need helping verbs, too, when speculating. Apparently, the originators of language struggled when thinking about anything more creative than the immediately apparent and the remembered events of yesterday.
In any event, once launched into the imagination, we return to the original “B” with just a little flourish. This gives us “been”. And that’s as complicated as we get. Aren’t you relieved?
Oh, yes, you also will need to learn the conjugations of all those helping verbs, and to this point we have only discussed the state or condition of a single moment or event and not circumstances that persist over time. But that would introduce “being” (which can also be a noun which takes us down a different road).
Here’s a little help for now and the New Year. You will only need to say “I/it/you/we will be” and you have all you need to plan. Just don’t complicate things with those pesky “what ifs”, and you will be fine.
*For those who want to know the reasons behind is/am/are and was/were, see comments in Shadows section of this site.
#EnglishLanguage #EnglishConjugations