By J.J. Tindall
Death of a Blind Woman’s Cat (Free Sons)
“The day will come when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you are throttling today.” – Inscription on the memorial to the Haymarket Martyrs, Forest Home Cemetery, Forest Park, IL
The silence
of the cool, mid-afternoon
sun
broke only
with the wash
of automobiles
hurtling down
the Eisenhower Expressway
just south.
Mrs. Thibodeaux
disdained air-conditioning
but her daughter,
up occasionally
from Atlanta,
insisted
on central-air
for the 40s vintage
bungalow
at Jackson Boulevard
and Harlem Avenue.
Her late husband
installed
the panel brick exterior
himself
after retiring
from the military
in the mid 70s.
Her son and grandson
were Army, too.
It was
a family thing,
in no small measure
dictated by their
caramel-colored skin,
the blast furnace
that is the putrid lie
of “race”
dictating inhuman heroism
in exchange
for barely recognized
humanity.
Relentlessly.
She’d bristle
when her wise but
bitter grandson
insisted
“Race is just a lie,
gramama . . . ”
In the silence
between her Stories,
the TV soaps
to which
she remained loyal
even after diabetes
rendered her blind,
she knew. Her old cat
Scrapple
had disappeared
to die. To where,
she wasn’t certain,
although the old cat
stayed indoors, and she knew
she’d smell it
soon enough.
Her husband died
in 1983, his funeral procession
just another
heading west
down Jackson Boulevard
from the church
on Oak Park Avenue
across Harlem
to the cemeteries
along the Des Plaines River
here in Forest Park,
specifically
to Free Sons,
south of Waldheim
and Silverman & Weis,
north of Woodlawn.
The Haymarket Martyrs
were west across the river
at Forest Home.
The cat, Mrs. Thibodeaux’s
last full-time companion,
will be buried
in the back yard
beneath the marigolds.
Mrs. Thibodeaux,
with relief,
knows she
will be next.
–
J.J. Tindall is the Beachwood’s poet-in-residence. He welcomes your comments. Chicagoetry is an exclusive Beachwood collection-in-progress.
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More Tindall:
* Chicagoetry: The Book
* Ready To Rock: The Music
* Kindled Tindall: The Novel
* The Viral Video: The Match Game Dance
Posted on August 13, 2013