Geography

By Khadija Anderson

When I was young my mother told tales
of pussy willows and cattails
Cardinals red as maraschino cherries
and shoveling snow up to her thighs
in her childhood Chicago

I only knew obstinate terrain
blistering cement under bare feet
peacocks exploding from rooftops
Luis running unpaved roads of the varrio

Here Larks were cigarettes
an ornament for skinny boys with tousled hair
standing with hands in pockets
on their mothers’ porches
their mothers who also came from the cold