uphill both ways

you need to have grown up in the mountains
the poor mountains of Appalachia
on a steep street, a crumbly street,
a place where stone walls didn't stand up long
where dinner plates slid off the table
all by themselves, unless you held on tightly –
when I say steep, I mean steep!

the school was up at the top of the hill, of course
crane your neck from the porch and you could see it
if the snow piles weren't too high
(fact: it doesn't snow like that any more)
back then the schools didn't close for any reason
you were expected to get your bare feet
into the classroom and on time, or else –
nuns with rulers, need I say more?

dad was insane, understandable for the times,
all that coal dust, the lucky strikes and bathtub gin
door hinges didn't grow on trees, he would say
imploring us to use the front door and back door
alternately, so as to wear the hinges evenly
and don't slam either door, or so help me god!

mornings we used the front door on our way to school
all twelve of us, the tall ones up front to serve as beacons
for the little ones whose heads were barely above the snow
it was straight up and steep, you already know that,
but it was a long way, too, requiring that we embark
before dawn, short on sleep, our pancake breakfast
a distant memory from the weekend

after school we were to come home through the back door
on the rickety downhill side of the house
there was only one way to get there
from school, that meant a detour around the open pit mine
across the railroad yard and down to the tough part of town
so low and narrow that the sun didn't touch those streets all winter
giving those who lived there a tinge of blue in their skin
and an irritability that frightened even the junkyard dogs

then it was uphill again with the help of the rope pull
that Mr. Stanowitz installed when his ninety year old mother could no
longer make it home along the path from church six days a week
beyond there we had only to cross the frigid but wadable creek
and then sneak through the PCB factory grounds
(our little shortcut)

finally, we'd sprint up, up, up the two hundred forty step wooden staircase –
two hundred sixty-eight if you counted the rotten ones you couldn't
walk on or you'd fall right through – before reaching our gate (phew!)
frozen, rusted; no matter, we had to climb it

there mother stood waiting, her trademark upside down smile,
ready to greet us with fresh-baked cookies
assuming they didn't slide off the flimsy paper plate
onto the rocky outcrop that was the back yard
in which case the goat got them