Ode to Houston
Praise the laundry room
With the little table
Where I got my school work done
Day after day, for months.
Praise my Nana
Who sat with me everyday
Teaching me the 2nd grade curriculum,
So I could visit my dad in the hospital
After I got my work done.
Praise the journal
That I hated
Because I never knew what to write about
So I would sit there,
And wait for my spinning brain to get an idea
So I could go see my dad.
Praise that apartment pool in Houston,
That I swam in countless times,
And would take videos of myself, jumping in the pool,
To send to my dad, while he was laying in the hospital,
With cancer,
Fighting for his life.
Praise the red raincoat,
On the back of the laundry room door
That I pledged allegiance to
Every day before homeschool,
Until we finally got to come home.
Praise the airplane
That finally took us away from Texas to our home,
And praise the airplane seat beside me
Where my dad sat.
-Tessa Hartley, freshman
-inspired by Kevin Young's "Ode to the Hotel Near the Children's
Hospital"
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