Revelation

When three of us
were eating in Molly's Café
Herlan volunteered
(certainly no one asked him):

"Do you know I was an orphan
Someone left me in front
of Good Hope House

"without even a note
pinned to my blanket
the nurses judged me
to be about one month old

"I grew
but I never was your
Ivory Soap baby--
No one wanted to adopt a flat-faced kid
with red straw for hair

"I stayed in the orphanage
until FDR wanted me
for the ССC
and paid me a dollar a day
for doing work I loved"

Notes

McDaniel, Wilma. (2001) Borrowed Coats. Hanging Loose Press, Brooklyn, New York.
Courtesy University of California, Merced Library. Copyright owned by the Regents of the University of California.