Thick Louisiana air smacks my skin and says
honey, time moves so slow here even the river strolls.
And so I roll up my sleeves to welcome the mud,
not knowing that we were already old friends.
We ride through New Orleans neighborhoods in the back of pick-up trucks
while we pass by homes without walls and dogs without collars.
In some houses, all that’s left is the plumbing, a singular bathroom sink.
We try to keep our balance going over bumps,
avoiding dumpsters and piles of bricks, branches, drywall, and siding.
The bed of the truck creaks under our weight.
A maroon Chevy lays stuck between cement and a loblolly pine.
I look out from the balcony decorated with beach chairs and familiar faces
while an orange hue seeps through the street lights and into the night sky.
In the morning I hammer nails into wood into blue tarps into roofs.
The vibrations shudder up my arm but
we cannot have leaking leaving brown splotches that cost too much.
In turn for our work that feels less like work and more like faith
we receive bags of salty chips and slow, southern thank you’s.
And so I read notes left on wooden bunk beds telling me
about how a city can change a person,
about how we must trust the process and timing of life,
about how moments and places like these
will show you some sort of something,
whatever it is that you may be looking for,
but I don’t write mine.
I don’t write mine until the ceiling cracks from the weight of my ancestors.
I don’t write mine until the light shining in from my window fades to a static grey.
I don’t write mine until I’m home again with a roof and walls and it does not feel like a home.
Time moves much quicker here.
-Catherine Buckley