Black Eyed Pea

Thirty years ago, I lived here, final pocket
of Southwest Avenue, road parallel to the train track
cutting through the shale crust 

of this small mountain.
That steel steed makes it my way, coming 

around like clockwork like some orange
peel parted from her homeland gently with thumbs
just to spiral back again at four a.m.

Four months I lived here as an infant,
my father would spend evenings on the front porch, my older

sister next to him, and me, baby
balanced on his left leg. Held together,
we’d gaze at the storm, wait for the train

watch traffic lights like some urban
shooting stars I was too young then

to wish upon. In the decades since,
my grandmother’s life filled this ancestral
home, built by her own grandfather 

in the 1940s, he laid the brick she’d later
carve her name into by the front door’s 

handle, careful bubble letters, I imagine
she held her breath to keep them
smooth. New Year’s day, caravan

of cousins parked along the dead end street
we’d eat red meat, mashed potatoes, 

collards, and black-eyed peas
for money, for the hope of a better year
as though vegetables could slingshot us 

from one social class to the next.
Each child was expected to do her 

part, a few bites to contribute what little
hands couldn’t yet do, but to me
they were bitter, salty morsels I avoided

so I’d bury the smallest bean
beneath a mound of starch, black-eyed

seed of luck a prayer
I hoped would sprout, hoped
that the one starling 

would be enough
as my uncle and father shoveled back piles 

of the folklore my great grandmother
carried in her from Shelton
North Carolina. In the backyard, 

they’d plant rows of runner beans
to feed us in the summer, chilly

first day of the year a distant memory
and I’d walk through the divots
between mounds as tall as my shins.

Reaching the end, I’d arch backward
and look up to green grapes 

overhead on the clothesline vine,
condensed and complicated
as star patterns, hieroglyphics of fruit

I could almost touch. Just
short enough, I’d need tiptoes
to pinch the lowest ones

between my thumb and pointer
finger, burst them like raindrops

split open by the sharp beak
of a bird, if my great-grandmother
could be embodied again

I know this would be her.