Ice Boxes and Outhouses
I remember ice boxes, outhouses and getting water from the pump.
And the ice truck coming down our city street with my friends
Grabbing pieces of ice to suck, walking the hot tar road.
The indoor bathroom Andrew built at the bottom of the cellar stairs.
I remember a sunny summer day at the cottage in Brechin Beach
With the Arnetts and the Cowies gathered in laughter and play
As Catherine does the hula in a grass skirt and double cone top
That Jimmy brought back from the South Pacific after the War.
I remember on the lawn of our brick house on Tolton Street
The Kodak box camera with the accordion fold-out front
Taking pictures of uncles in their uniforms
Before they are hung up with cedar and moth balls forever.
I remember pinwheel cookies and homemade bread,
And running to the corner to meet Catherine as she got off the bus
From the cotton mill where in numbing noise she ran the machines
That wound the spools on hundreds of cones of string and thread.
