Ranting Elders

Ranting Elders

       by Shoeless Doug

                                                            is it she or is it me

                                                  who by the brooke the booke

                                                of poems adorns

                           hair golden as the noon

                             in sunny dubrovnik

                            eyes blue as the sea

                                    that about the harbour posts

                                      and boats lies green

                                                so light

                                    you'd think the domes

                                                            of new leafe

                                                glass cathedral

                                             aspen

                                                      had fallen

                                             in a cup

                                                                        of porcelain

                                                    on a saucer

                                             of the same

I was bussing toward home on the 11:04 (they come only ever 41 minutes between 11:23 to 3:29) today. My usual 8:22 didn't show up (which isn't unusual for a Transcona stop) and I sat beside this old woman who gave me an earful about everything. Well, she sat down beside me. I was at the window. There were lots of empty seats, too. I guess I could have got up and left. Once she started I couldn't very well just barge past her and go farther back. She was wearing a babushka and a hat pin in her black hat, the sort my grandmother still has in her old clothers trunk. We used to dress up in her trunk clothes. She didn't smell very nice. I thought maybe Ben Gay and perfume and underwear. But.

       "Did you see the picture of the shoes?" she said.

       "No," I said. I really didn't say much. She just kept on talking.

       "They shouldn't show that! Not for everyone to see. Kids could see that! The old lady got hit. A hit and run. One minute . . ., the next  . . . . Maybe I knew her even. You never know. Maybe it was Alvara next door. The shoes looked like hers. You know, not very expensive. The kind you buy at a bargain shoe store that look like the more expensive kind?"

       "Maybe she was crossing the street on a red light," I said. Sometimes old people cross when they shouldn't. Like, they'll wait there when it's 'Walk' and look both ways to see if cars are coming and then when it's almost 'Don't Walk' they step out and slowly start to cross. I feel like yelling, 'Don't walk, you'll get hit!' But they wouldn't hear me anyway. They don't hear well. They're almost always deaf, you know."

       The old woman said, loudly enough for the person a few rows back to hear, "that's cause they're old, not stupid! They can't get going as quickly as you can! They shouldn't have the 'Walk' so short. Anyway, these shoes, all alone, nothing else in the picture, on the front page of the paper. I felt so sorry for whoever. I hope she's okay. Talking about shoes, did you read about the Jewish march in Winnipeg?"

(to be continued)