1933: Burden’s landing
robert penn warren
down home in louisiana
it was always the same way when i came home
and saw my mother. i would be surprised that it
was the way it was, but i knew at the same time
that i had known it would be this way. i would
come home with the firm conviction that she
didn’t really care a thing about me, that i was
just another man whom she wanted to have
around because she was the kind of woman
who had to have men around and had to make
them dance to her tune. But as soon as i saw
her, i would forget all that. Sometimes i forgot it
even before i saw her. anyway, when i forgot it, i
would wonder why we couldn’t get along. i would
wonder even though i knew what would happen,
even though i would always know that the scene
into which i was about to step and in which i
was about to say the words i would say, had
happened before, or had never stopped hap-
pening, and that i would always just be enter-
ing the wide, white, high-ceilinged hall to see
across the distance of the floor, which gleamed
like dark ice, my mother, who stood in a door-
way, beyond her the flicker of firelight in the
shadowy room and smiled at me with a sud-
den and innocent happiness, like a girl. Then
she would come toward me, with a brittle, ex-
cited clatter of heels and a quick, throaty laugh,
and stop before me and seize a little bunch of
my coat between the thumb and forefinger of
each hand, in a way that was childlike and both
weak and demanding, and lift her face up to
me, turning it somewhat to one side so that i
could put the expected kiss upon her cheek.
The texture of her cheek would be firm and
smooth, quite cool, and i would breathe the
scent which she always used, and as i kissed
her i would see the plucked accuracy of the
eyebrow, the delicate lines at the corner of
the eye toward me, and note the crinkled,
