When you're
the tender age of six,
the only things you know
are real are the things
you see and hear
and how they make you feel
On a dreary November day
in Ohio in 1963,
all I knew was that
every adult around me was sad
Flickering black and white images
shown over and over again
on the small television
in our living room
were making
them cry
silently,
disbelievingly
all I knew was that
the nuns sent us home from school
their faces grim as they ushered us out,
as the bell tolled in the tower,
as Camelot came to an end…
…and on his burial day I remember thinking
how pretty that lady was in her mourning mantilla
how brave that little girl and boy were
as he saluted his daddy's hearse
in a tiny boy's goodbye
how, as my mother gathered me to her tearfully
as the funeral procession went by
in grainy black and white,
how happy I was that I
still had mine…