Red Ram
Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
The very old speech therapist
that my parents could barely afford
tried everything to help me
make the R sound
because nobody made it very far in life
without the R sound
One day you heard she knew magic
Then you heard she was 300 years old
Then you saw her barking back at stray dogs
and hurling toenail clippings at motorcyclists
from the sidewalk.
After six weeks
she threw up her veiny hands
and set them on my iroko desk
She glanced around a moment
This isn’t funny anymore
I still see everything
Full head full head
Red hair red hair
My eyes were dry and starting to burn
from the sounds she was making
Blood art! Red bed! December finger!
She was screaming now
Blood red! Ripped red!
I still see everything!
You see? You see?
What haven’t I seen?
She might have said more
I might have convulsed briefly
But I remember her eyes were blank
cloudier than usual
An ancient kind of blank
I remember wondering which of us it was
that needed help
She pulled away from my desk
and gestured for me to try again
I blinked the heat away from my eyes
and held a finger to my notes
Two words out of several hundred
started glowing like embers
A sound between a yelp and a squawk
escaped the therapist
when I exhaled the words red ram
The sound made my parents
come flying through the door
She could have charged an extra half million
and they would not have cared.