It's Still Life

Salt and Lot’s and Lots

Saturday morning
was library day,
and on the way home,
two or three blocks past
the Holy Blessed Heart Catholic church,

was a tavern with red
neon lettered signs
scrawled across the windows.
I can’t recall its name;
we weren’t allowed to look directly at it.

And Mum, in her self-
assured Baptist wisdom,
marched us like a happy
legion across the street —
away from Catholics and ideology,

away from tavern scourge
and its rough vagrants.
Her heart was humming
Onward Christian Soldiers,
and my sister and I kept our eyes

forward because we
knew about Lot’s wife.
Given a chance, Mum
would’ve bolted us away
like a back door. And when my sister

grew up and left home,
well, she immediately
became a Lutheran and
forgot all about salt.
I was happy being almost vegetarian

and eating lots of eggs fried
sunny-side up with lots of salt.

written (some what tongue in cheek) for Miz Quickly’s Old Coin prompt. Ninety-three percent of this is true. By the way, and that.