THE ARGONNE HOTEL PRESS CHAPBOOK SERIES

RUBY & OTHER LIVES
Poems by SHARON NEGRI

RUBY: Uncle Ray Tells of Ruby • Ruby Was My Girl • Ruby’s Words • Laura Holds On To Ruby • At Eva’s Shop • Ruby’s Words • Blaze Thinks Back • Father Grady • John, Years Later • Ruby’s Father Remembers • Ruby’s Words • Michael’s Mother • Dottie’s Coffee Shop • Ruby’s Words • Mr. Jacobs • Packing Her Things •
OTHER LIVES: Suitcase Mary in the Cemetary • Coming, New York • South Pearl Street • Blood’s Precision • Woman With Blind Daughter, Shopping • A Small Piece of Heaven

$7.00 US • 40 pages

Copyright © 1996, 1999 The Argonne Hotel Press. ISBN 1-88761-11-4
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Uncle Ray Tells of Ruby

Her grandma died by the poison
and second cousin, Rose
there are those who say
women in this family are damned
born with a runaway sin in the blood
some just bend and break
like a storm-struck tree
because of it.

Ruby was a pretty girl
she and her mama
lived two towns over
came to visit every spring
after the Easter parade
her new clothes
pinks and yellows
pressed perfect

found a stone next to the curb
year she was eight
said it was shining a certain way
looking back at her
went out to the shed and
polished it for hours
I swear to you
that thing got bright as lightning

next year she told me about the dream
the stone turned to a ring
slipped itself on and
took her out the window
riding to heaven on a rocket of wind
scared at first
she started to pray
it would come back every night.

Thirty years since then
been staying here in the house
I found her body near the creek at noon
just when the thunder let up
she was holding that stone
still pretty as ever
her fingers cupped
catching the rain.

Ruby Was My Girl

Her daddy left when she was six,
I took care of her best I could
being alone all those years,
we’d walk Market Street on Friday nights,
she’d beg to look at rings and rhinestone barrettes
in Lou’s five-and-dime,
birthdays we’d go to Rockwell’s,
buy bath oils, dusting powder with yellow puffs,
at Easter, hats and gloves,
she kept a cedar box with embroidered handkerchiefs
and a heart-shaped mirror on her nightstand,
tried lipstick for the first time at ten,
said she’d send kisses to her daddy
if she knew where to find him.

She nearly married once,
a Norfolk sailor,
met him the year she found work there,
came home with her just one Christmas,
surprised us all when he slipped on the diamond,
asked for a church wedding,
she wanted a lace gown, mint green for me,
high mass in August,
we picked out star lilies at Flowers By Anne,
asked Eva to do her hair,
but she called that July, crying,
a thing deep down was stopping her,
warning it would come to a terrible end
though I never said, I believed it would.