I wanted that plastic recorder.
Wanted it so much that when mom
suggested I could earn that two dollars
by defrosting the freezer, I sat
on the black-and-white tiled kitchen floor
with a blow drier on high. For hours.
Sat there watching each drip.
Sat there longer, perhaps,
than the cumulative time I played
my recorder, but I tell you,
I cherished that brown plastic tube.
Every “Hot Cross Buns” I played
was an anthem to self-determination.
Almost fifty years later I don’t remember
what I read yesterday, but I remember
one a penny, two a penny.
I remember the drip, drip, drip of the frost.
I remember my mom saying,
No, not yet. Keep going.
I remember my lips on the mouthpiece,
the flesh of my fingertips
pressed on the holes,
the shrill music filling the kitchen.