Poetry by Laura Bontrager
(for Ruby Bridges and Charles Burks)
(a series of short vignettes about the year in which Ruby Bridges was escorted to her newly integrated school by the US Marshal Charles Burks).
—
November 14
I have to admit. this
is a new one. playing baby-sitter
to a girl, barely
reaching my hip holster. when
she comes to the door, toast
is still hot in her hands. she grins
with a gap. her dress looks
uncomfortably white.
—
I have
pointed my weapon
at a hundred faces. not all evil only
poor choices. once, a life existed
outside my own and I
had
to pull the trigger. it is not
something to relish. it carries
me
or I carry it. I
can’t tell yet. so when
the gun
rests at my side, encased
in leather and a suit,
I know it is not really resting.
merely
waiting.
—
she is just a
tiny thing.
and I have to take hobbled steps
so I don’t
out-distance her.
even still,
she is right at my heels.
—
when we get to the car,
she slides in
lifts her gloaming face to me and
I follow.
with one hand, I
tuck the tag back down
into her sweater, feel
her warm neck.
the car growls and
pushes forward. like always,
she is whispering
to God, eyes closed. I want
to wrap her carefully in
a white blanket and
deposit her back
into her mother’s arms.
only
we head for school
instead.
—
she keeps humming.
I have to bite back
a rebuke–she
is just a kid, a first-grader
making her way to her first
day of school. a lot of
firsts this one.
I let my hand fall
to my hip. the man keeping
step beside me glances around,
alert.
I must not forget
what it is
we’re doing here.
she keeps up
like a good little soldier.
—
so I rented a house. this
is taking longer than I thought.
my wife and son drove down
to occupy the white rooms with me. my boy
is angry at the move because, at his old
school, the biggest boy asked him
to a birthday party. with zoo animals.
a real lion, he says. a real, honest,
mean lion.
and I pull his head against
my hip for a hug and think,
there are lions
here, too.
—
June
today,
when we left,
the mob was more like a crowd and
the buildings were at our backs,
I could see the car
in view, we were almost
home free.
then,
her shoe
scuffed the uneven
white sidewalk,
tripping–
she reached up and
snatched my hand,
tight,
holding on.
—
