Ancestral DNA

I come from a line of strong women.
My DNA perseveres.
I carry in my body ancestral memories of pain and hunger,
courageous action and adventurous undertakings.
I hold in my cells the desperate desire for a better life.
I hold in my breaking heart the dream of a better world.

© Christine Salkin Davis, 2018


Comments

Post a Comment

Your comments and feedback are welcome. Please be sure to be respectful.

Popular posts from this blog

Anniversary Memories

(upon the anniversary of my dad's death)

Afternoon shadows deepen
and anniversary memories trigger the saddest day of my life.
Twenty-seven years of loss feels like yesterday
and I struggle to remember
your voice,
your smile,
your laughing eyes,
dry sense of humor inherited.

I learned,
but under-appreciated
your stoic sense of responsibility and self-control, commitment, and incapsulated joy,
respect,
and I just want you to know,
I appreciate you
now.

© Christine Salkin Davis, 2018

Read more

Tropical Depression

Carrying coffee around like a baby's
bottle, appreciating the electric grid
and praying it holds, still
safe and dry, some aren't,
pelting rain sounding like ping
pong balls dropping against the back
drop of howling wind, flood
warnings widespread, refuged by
brick, buried cables, some aren't,
trees taking the brunt, waving
limbs, so far so good,
some aren't so fortunate. Bird
singing in the storm, dog
at my feet, sheltered, protected,
some aren't.

© Christine Salkin Davis, 2018




Read more

The Beginning of the Alps

We ride by Alpine aspen trees and listen to the hum of the bus;
a back beat to the tour guide’s Spanish, English, German, spiel.

Napoleon’s defeat,
Ilba—18-year old daughter of the Austrian Emperor had a forced marriage to Napoleon. History lesson:
peace treaty,
return home.
cuatro años.

Today,
highway and roadside industry, farmland,
concrete and asphalt and corns and grasses,
clear sky.

Cold skin against unfamiliar air conditioning,
benedictine monastery.

Vamos.

Romantic valley of the Wachauw:
apricot trees and vineyards,
sound of horse hooves on cobblestone streets, kayakers and motorboats pass our tourist barge and 
across the aisle, the George Clooney lookalike  — if George Clooney had been an accountant instead of an actor —  smiles at a woman in the next seat.


© Christine Salkin Davis, 2018















Read more