Carnival Glass Tea Cup
My first memory as a little
carnival glass tea cup
was at a fair. I could hear
the noises of the merry-go-round,
the men calling out to potential
game players/money spenders,
and excited children laughing,
and calling out to each other.
Being tiny I couldn’t see much
of these things.
I sat by glasses and cups
much bigger than me.
I could hear the clink of the
coins as they hit their sides.
“Ouch that hurt! Don’t throw
them so hard! Oh, that one tickled!”
Then I saw him. The red headed kid about twelve years
old.
He tossed a few nickels then
bingo! it went inside me,
rolled around and it did
tickle until it rested on the bottom.
I was snatched up and the boy
they called Jim took me home.
I sat in a cozy home on the
shelf for many years.
watching Jim’s large rowdy
family. Then one day I turned up
at his daughter’s home. I could tell she liked me a lot.
I sat on her favorites shelf
for years watching her write.
But one
day, sadly, she packed me up in a cardboard box.
Someone
was moving in and she needed space.
So I sat for years in a dark crawl
space until the flood came.
I thought I’d drown or freeze
in the cold water but the flood abated.
I was put in a bag, in a big
truck and hauled off to be sorted out
with thousands of other moldy
items in large bags.
I’m now eighty-five years old
and stashed away in a stinky mess.
I know she’s worried about me.
Will she ever find me?
