A FRAYED RED MITTEN

A RED FRAYED MITTEN

Few friends knew why I sat
on a snow bank, close to
frozen ice – watching them
skate –

My frayed red mitten would
be covering my pointer finger
as I drew names, houses, on
ice –

Mother wondered why I never
wanted to skate – she knew I
detested brown straps around
my ankles on sparkling white
skates –

We walked up Seneca Street
turned left on Lenox Road and
a few more blocks, there it was
Steinmiz Park, frozen for all
neighborhood children –

Wind blew in my face, coated
nose, Ice stiffened gloves –
then I sat and drew pictures
with my pointer, with frayed
red mittens –

Watched mother skate, and
all my friends. Watched girls
twill as I did when I danced
on toe – or in slippers of pink
or black –

I watched until mother and
my brother were ready to take
another cold - walk home, now
wind against my back –
shoving me –

No one saw the city I carved
in ice, left behind near the
snow bank.

Nancy Duci Denofio
2011 @all right reserved

INDIAN STYLE

INDIAN STYLE

the porch, in front
near roses,
near metal milk crates
above colored slate
from Vermont – is where
she sits – Indian Style,
on top of pieces of
wood, warped, and
gray paint peeling

the porch near two
doors leading to
two families in a
city, on a corner lot
in a city filled with
children who played,
played – as she watched.
where she
smiled when a friend
walked by, a friend one
day –

sitting Indian Style
she smiled once more
if another friend walked
by – near hedges
lining the property,
her feet
touched cement, her head
looked straight ahead –

legs crossed Indian
style on the porch
where fingers picked
at pieces of wood
covered in gray paint,
a smile on her face
a stray tear rolled
down her face,
caught the edges of
her lips, where a
smile – remained

scooting over to the
right, toward the
metal milk box,
she opened the lid
and there – inside
where paper dolls
were stored inside,
she saw her friends
smile back.

Nancy Duci Denofio
All Rights Reserved
@2010

NO ONE CAME TO VISIT

NO ONE CAME TO VISIT


no one came with flowers
no one came with pink
balloons or candy
no one brought pink dresses
to fit a new born.

Mother, she knew.

No one believed
or wanted to see a child
who entered this world
a little over a pound -
medical men told her,
“She won’t survive the
night.”

Mother, she knew -

she knew when two men
visited
knew only one – but
knew of the other
one man sat to her right
one man to her left.

These visitors did not
bring balloons or candy
or a pink dress for their
new grand daughter –
a baby who would fit into
their palm -

a baby with tubes in
temples –
a body to small and
needles too large

both men died before
the birth of her child

her father spoke to her,
her father in law
listened. . .

“Don’t worry she will
survive and make you
proud.”

Medical men entered
her room and mother
smiled.
Medical men warned
her – “Babies this small
do not survive.” –

Mother, she knew.

Daddy entered her room
she smiled.
told him their little girl
would survive
he pulled a chair up to her
bed, held her hand, and
listened. . .

He probably smiled back
he must have warned her
to face the truth -
mother, stubborn,
she believed.

A few days passed,
the medical men told her
again –
a week went by, and she
smiled -
two weeks, the medical
men stopped talking of
death –

Mother peered through
glass at her baby –
lying inside a metal box –
inside with tubes and monitors
with no one to touch a child’s
grey skin.

She watched as a chest
was forced to expand
she prayed to herself –
she waved good bye -
thanking the Medical men –
telling them she would be back

every day – to watch a child
who barely opened her eyes.

There was no touching,
or cuddles, no wrapping
of tiny fingers around her own,
no legs kicking, or laughing
when a child yawned, thinking
it was a smile

no one talked about their
little girl –
no one asked about the color
or her hair – her eyes or her
personality
no one asked if she looked
like mother or father . . .
no one talked.

Mother, she believed.

Every day – from summers
end into dead leaves of fall
onto ice on city walks,
she walked up a hill
to the hospital to stare
through glass –
her walk home - eyes filled
with tears, she recited an
Irish prayer.

Every day after work
father walked up the hill
to stare at his child he
could not hold –
laying naked inside a metal
bed with tubes still
attached to her forehead.

He watched as nurses
tapped the soles of her
feet – to keep her awake
to suck on a miniature
bottle – she began to eat . . .

It was the day before
Christmas - a snow
filled sky – when news
arrived – she could come
home.

Three months and ten
days after her birth
she weighed five pounds -

nurses wrapped her
in tiny booties
a white undershirt
a small pink dress - now
snuggled up inside pink
blankets

with open arms - mother
held her little girl
peered into her open eyes
pinched her little hands
and feet.

Mother, she knew

On Christmas day inside a
neighbor’s car they brought
their little girl home.

Mother looked at my father
and said, “I told you so,
she would survive.”

It was beneath their
Christmas tree – I laid
inside a red wagon –
my older brother next to me
a red bow tied around my
forehead -
Christmas and I finally
made it home.

Mother, she knew.

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL 1958

Elementary School 1958

There she was, entering the classroom
her head barely clearing the doorway.
Over six feet tall with feet we called
boats - as she flopped one after another
beneath her desk.

Her shoulders wide like a man,
her fingers so long, as a witch on purpose
scratching chalk on a chalkboard.

Miss Dawson was wearing a flowered
dress on this memorable morning,
me, in the fourth grade, me who she told
to meet her in the cloakroom.

Well, a trip to the cloakroom, alone, would
mean we were scolded for something
we did during class, but the teacher
barely said a word as she whispered – I
knew I did nothing to be reprimanded.

But this trip to the cloakroom
in the fourth grade - was to tell me
I wasn't good enough for her choir.

Can you imagine all those children
in the classroom – waiting – staring
toward the door to the cloakroom,
can you imagine me with tears in my eyes –
a sad face, my head down, being afraid to
glance up, walking slowly back to my desk.

When I finally reached my desk, and sat,
a tear fell onto my cheek and I heard
children chanting, “She can’t sing…”

1958 - I started our school talent show.
Our principal was Miss Hagarson - she told me,
“When you left elementary school they never
had another talent show.”
Guess I had talent collecting all the children
with talent…

Joey played the drums, and Cass sang…
Keith helped with the curtains and directing,
and the girls who could sing, carried on
like the other Nancy down the street, and Patty,
Donna, and Aggie.

I danced, and talked as if I were the
first commentator on stage, introducing
everyone and telling everyone how talented our
school was. When it came to the piano,
I even had the music teacher helping me, she knew
I wasn’t going to sing.

The big mouth kids, the trouble makers, I put
them to work too, everyone was in the show, not
one child left out…

You see – learning is a giant step – believing in
yourself is even bigger – so I turned it around
singing wasn’t the end of the world – it was the
beginning of mine.

Nancy Duci Denofio
(Note - this is a section of a memoir
which I changed to fit into a poetic memoir
for easy reading.)

LITTLE GIRL LEGS

LITTLE GIRL LEGS

little girl legs
patent leather shoes
walk - she dances on
her way to school

she gazes up
it shines like a
giant yellow balloon
on top of red brick

little girls
bewildered by its'
size, knows a sound
will cause her fear -
her feet, no longer
dance - instead
now dragging feet
across cement

a large yellow
balloon warns of
war - of bombs,
death - no family
left
sirens sound - hurts
small ear - or does
it hurt a mind calling
out in the middle of a
day -

together walk
little girls and boys
against a wall,
down two flights
of stairs to a
basement floor

neat - arms at their
side - straight -
no one laughs,
no one cries

small bodies sit
facing a putrid wall
of green - indian
style; girls bare
legs kiss gray cement
floors - heads touch
cold walls

hot air - inhale,
exhale, inhale on
bare flesh - eyes
closed - arms - hands
wrapped around a child's
head

all clear - a sound
erases fear as smiles
appear, pushing -
shoving - joking -
talking

until another day
unwrapped arms,
uncrossed legs -
hot air no longer
on little girl legs

Nancy Duci Denofio

CHARLIE MANSON KILL THE PIGS

Charlie Manson Kill the Pig

guards help small children
cross a busy street -
guards tell us to shut up
in front of a pizza shop
during a noon hour dance
guards monitor the corridor
at school – send girls home
if they roll a skirt too high
paint our lips, swear under
our breath, toss a rock at
a stop sign or walk too close
to the opposite sex

a generation without
sense or sensibility - our
heads empty - so some
smoked weed, left home,
slept naked under a full
moon - without a guard.
we felt freedom and could
run, be – do – say – sing
or spit – swear or dance

then the boy next door,
sent home in a casket…
last I saw him he was flying,
on a Harley, wanted to be one
of those hells angels - he
got tough without a guard

So – protest the war.
death, limbs off of bodies, eyes
blinded by fire - works of war
gangs multiplied –
protesters took to the streets
with magic of art – graffiti –
kill the pig – kill the pig,
the establishment, rich or
richer.
We found peace, free love…
we loved each other - except
the guard.

We ended up the doers and
performers; a lawyer,
doctor, mother – aunt or
uncle - teachers hiding
behind metal detectors at
school - you see,
freedom we once called
ours - a road we traveled,
has twisted into foreign knots,
don’t know who the guards
are, anymore

Nancy Duci Denofio
all rights reserved

HAVE YOU WALKED A PRIMROSE PATH?

HAVE YOU EVER WALKED A PRIMROSE PATH?

Three fifty foot lots seemed far, so distant
to a five year old. A five year old; gentle
meekness of a child, innocent yet filled with
fear - which lasted through the years.

A child tolerates what is learned, gives
permission - to elders – although a candy
man reacts to frayed arteries on a Primrose
Path; giddiness, twitching, twisting a
common leaf then ripping it to shreds.

Misbehavior, common to the onlooker –
perhaps today labeled attention deficit
disorder – some mental block – or far too
shy – or far too friendly - a child smiles.
A child knows the arteries to Primrose Path.

Loose stones are kicked, heads look down,
and the smile gone - for awhile. The distance
a child walks pollinates a vine, layering
failure – as a path brightens in a new lip of
daylight.

One day a child full of grace, and an
angel – wings carry the child above the
wickedness of wrongdoers – when simple
wings were observed as naughtiness
inside – full of sin – inside - anger builds
as a child walks a Primrose Path.

Children learn to behave and do as one is
told, even if words string webs where one
is trapped by personal damage – unlike
thorns on bushes.

An angel has no capacity to tell or ability
to convince, unskilled talent; a child
remains inside a capsule, a personal
space where words are muffled; then
heard as whining –



Blind dishonesty becomes a way of life
clouded by destruction but to one so
young what is destruction but a broken
toy – or ice cream falling from a cone: so,
the silencer still reins. . .

Why didn’t a child run on Primrose Path?

The silencer to a child is clown; a
round face, one who smiles, cheers
and praises those whom play his game.
A false affection, unknown to a five year
old who believes in clowns and grins.

At the end of Primrose Path the silencer
waits, an opened door, peacock feathers
on a wooden floor – hallucination will
play tricks – and everyone is watching
calling out your name.

The lady two fifty foot lots away, is
known to have mental problems, and
her only daughter killed crossing her
Primrose Path.

All around children fear the lady on the
porch who rocks back and forth, hands
out popcorn, laughs, and calls your
name to come and sit for awhile. All the
time the evil lurked next door.

Next door where new gifts are given –
and no one hears a whimper, and tears
dissolve; what was that? A child thinks. . .

Another time – a story stale, and those
living near Primrose Path love to watch
a belly jiggle, when someone laughs.

The poor, and needy, accept wrong
doers, denying any claims as false –
as the silencer inside stone walls
wallowing in personal wealth, steals
more than money, more than pride.



His soul sold to the devil before his
life became a pre historic charge
plate, his commission, offers of
penny candy to a child.

Proprietors knew the cost of being
poor, and so they learned to be
in business for themselves, a child
for collateral.

No window shopping on this path,
no neighbor would betray a friend
one trusted – no neighbor knew
about the piles of wooden boxes
where a silencer played.

No laws protected children from illegal
operations - a child stealer working
his own rackets - bargaining with a
child’s mind. His assault became his
sexual possession.

No one talked about the end of
Primrose Path, or believed any
child should walk with fear – too near
to be a prisoner: he hands out a
popsicle, or a stick of gum.

Those who walked the Primrose
Path left names etched on a brick
façade. Those who played on a
Primrose Path, kicked the can, jumped
rope, ran to play hide and seek, and
skinned their knees.

Those who played at the end of
Primrose Path, never spoke.


PART TWO

It remains inside like a piece of metal
rusting, corroding any possibility of a
future - children have been torn,
or crumbled as a piece of used paper.

A silencer warned – all hell would let
loose - if a child spoke.


PART THREE

A neighborhood praised the silencer
as if a prince among the paupers
bringing gifts to thank him for his
business, and sharing drinks, or a puff
on a cigarette; shown as a home movie
on a wall.

His world of destruction had no expert
witness, or media, or tip off – and he
knew the preacher. A silencer told
his own stories, but never revealed
his true tattletales.

Memory chases without real pain
or formal cause; no reason to kill
a child’s recollection of a simple life,
and a child closes lips, tight as a
clam trying to survive without water.
In front of you as if you knew blacking
out as black and white TV.

A parade down primrose path; a beaten
path, ruts and grooves and arteries
carried on informally: a hobby horse
occupying space on top of boxes, near a
festival of color, near feathers of a peacock,
his hiding place.

Nancy Duci Denofio
all rights reserved