A Continuing Narrative

i am not sure exactly where
i left off in my story
i get calls to interview sometimes
and they go well generally
i leave with a handshake and good intentions

i am directed to take
obligatory drug tests
and there really isn’t any way
that i could ever fuck that up

all of these things are more challenging
since i had to give up my car
but i have been given assurances
that wheels will be mine with a paycheck

trying not to sweat the small stuff
patience is a virtue, right?

my son is having headaches
again after he broke his neck back in the summer
and my oldest has determined that she will finish
her senior year in night school
she has no patience for waiting out the last few months
of the twelfth grade

and another kid moved in last week

and folks are always calling
wanting me to focus on this or that
that really isn’t important or necessary
and sometimes i wonder
really wonder
what i am doing sitting here

there is a little bird that comes in a hole in my house
almost as if he thinks
that if i will not come out to see him
he will come in to see me
and he flies around a while
and then i send him out the bathroom window
maybe he will fly away in the spring

maybe i will fly away too

By Emily Burns

Biography:

Emily Burns is a student of history, spending much of her spare time sewing her family’s wardrobe of 18th and 19th century clothes. She volunteers at several historic sites around her home in central Kentucky; teaching about women’s skills of the past. Emily has been reading poetry since the age of twelve and began exploring voice and writing about ten years ago.

Emily holds a B.A. in English from the University of Kentucky and has published several books. Dalliance, poetry with images in words that describe the hills, the countryside, the flora and fauna and the heart of a Kentucky poet, which was published by Old Seventy Creek Press in 2010. She edited and published John Sternemann’s posthumous anthology Banging a Drum: words from sacred spaces in 2014.

Historic publications include, The Children’s Civil War Alphabet Book, an abcedarian book that includes photos and stories from her living history adventures with her own kids. Emily also published Our Receipts: a Civil War cookbook, which includes various recipes from the mid-19th century, including a variety of main dishes and dessert as used in Civil War reenactments. Tea and Manners, a compilation of articles describing fashion, etiquette and recipes for a 19th century tea. And finally, What a Lady Should Know about Health and Medicine in the mid-19th Century, which is a compilation of articles from period sources including recipes for common cures from the pre-Civil War era.