Aunt Betty Jane

by Esto Banga

they gave aunt Betty Jane two names
to help her keep track of herself
you can call her by either one you know
she'll smile like a Jessup band saw (you can
still get these cheap in North Carolina)
then try to get out of her bad-cat-scratched
big red chair but stuck in by 50 years
of country chicken parts makes it up only
half the time

she knows two cats died in that chair
snuffed out by old age or fairly old hairballs
one was Fake Jake who we figure still sits
stinking up a Whitman's candy box she's
got buried in a pile of peed-on
yardsale dresses with a real hard
chinchilla hat she won't
wear since it gives her hives
makes her face look like a horse
sat on it while thinking about
New Jersey

she remembers something like
Harry Truman or the A-bomb
but she can't tell you if
they were TV news or bar-b-ques
thinks all actresses are named Taloolah
all dogs Pinchy-Winchy (Jesus,
maybe we'd all be better that way)

she likes to wipe the chins of
all the kids and say "just like butter"
whatever the hell she means by that
she wiped me enough times growing
up to turn my chin into bugfat
but damn I'd always run around the
house once -- just so she'd forget
and do it again

She's got rickets now - some wobbly ass
wonders why we don't let her use the stairs
and maybe thinks back to
Kenny Landrum's Cherry Busto-rama
they set her up to dance for laughs
nearly died when she figured
it all out. I did too to tell you
the truth -- never said so never
bring it up -- not to Betty Jane
not to no one
bad way to start and stop a life

Kenny came by one day to
say he's sorry toting two years late
some crappy flowers and a lame invite for a
wild evening of bingo and
warm root beer. Betty'd a done
it except that Uncle Teal stepped out
with the pruners asking if Kenny'd
mind recycling the front
half of his pecker

someday I'm going back for sure
she'll still be there riding that fuzzy-wreck
chair face jammed full of sugared muck
they feed her not having really lived
refusing pretty much to die

I swear I'm going to hug her even if
she dribbles Piney Sweet Sauce
down my neck -- blows a grimey fudge bubble --
just to tell her she was about as close as
I could get to what you people call a mother

she won't understand she'll just stare up like a
plate-load of grits grin a mouth half full of
brown teeth grunt something useless
not never knowing she's as
big as Hollywood as famous as the Queen

*****

-- EB
©2000 by Esto Banga

Esto Banga reports that he can not be reached.