Who Am I?

I am from piano lessons and trading cards,
from good china and outhouses.
I am from air raid drills and security posters
on the Turnpike.

I am from the Chapel on the Hill
and church held in the Ridge Theater.
I'm from the conservative right,
so how did I get to the liberal left?

I'm from biscuits and gravy or honey,
and the coffee pot plugged in all day.

I'm from teachers and principals,
and also from farmers and truckdrivers.
I'm from Methodists and Baptists,
and have become neither.

I'm from salt-of-the-earth "people,"
now trying to survive in a world alone.
From extended family to nuclear family.

From Appalachian folk culture
to the Atomic City.
Who knew Oak Ridge would ever
be "the good old days"?



After "where i'm from" by George Ella Lyon
from where i'm from: where poems come from (1999)