Who Am I

Who am I at this moment

Is this me

Imagining

The cool water on my feet

And tiny little fish

Nibbling on my toes

In the ancient waters of my ancestral home

 

Or am I some other little girl

From long ago

Whose feet are dangling

Whose toes a wiggling away

The tiny little fish

Nibbling on her toes 

In the same water

In the same place

A River highway

 

 

It is difficult to tell

Sometimes

Often she is so real

To me

And I wonder

If her blue eyes

Twinkle in mine

If her laugh

Echoes in mine

If her attention was captured

By the bees and hummers and cardinals

That capture mine

 

At this blurry, water-color moment

There are notes

Floating on the breeze

Sweet sounds of hope-filled dreams

Is it my voice

Or hers

 

It doesn’t matter

Her story 

Of leaving home

And finding home

Along another River Highway

In a far off place

Is mine too

I shall live it

I shall tell it

And maybe our story will bring

Courage

To another child

Whose feet dangle in the waters

Of a River highway

 

 

This poem was completed on 27 July 2019.  It came out of an experience as I was contemplating a paper that I am writing.  The little girl referred to in the poem is my 7 times great grandmother Mary Goldtman Starnes who left Germany as a 6 year old girl, in the spring of 1709, and embarked upon a year long journey,  with her family as refugees leaving their home near Alzey, Germany and eventually settling along the banks of the Hudson River in New York.  It was a struggle for her family, which included near starvation, illness, and death, but she survived.

All over the world refugees and immigrants are still struggling and are facing so many people who are against them.  Conditions worldwide are deplorable, especially at our (USA)  southern borders.  We have much for which to repent.  Lord, in your mercy…