King of the Stepsitters

In Memory of My Father, Bardie Harlis Anderson

He Drove a ’49 Ford

And brought bags of penny candy

Home at a quarter till six.

I was King of the Stepsitters!

Crumpled brown septer

Dolling out favors,

Like a red-neck politician paving drive-ways for votes.

To keep or share?

I chose the choice of greater pleasure!

Five lonely Tootsie Rolls can’t compare

 To sweetness savored

With chocolate-drooling subjects

In my Arbor-Vitae Kingdom By the Street,

Where sheet-lightning and fire-flies flickered

And hyenas picked their teeth with

Bones of their victims!

He was an old-fashioned strong man

Never said “Son, I love you,”

But why else would he make me

Prince of the Twilight,

King of the Stepsitters?