Working class cottages hold no interest for speculators, or those who wish to restore the elegance of nineteenth century high-button splendor, top hats and tails, calling cards in the foyer.
Working class cottages always held the laborers. Factory workers on the line--- Eastman Kodak assembly, Bausch and Lomb, Hickey Freeman immigrant hands stitching suits and making buttons.
Working class cottages raised up those who washed other people’s clothes in other people’s kitchens, fed other people’s children, came home to hungry mouths of their own, crying “Mama, mama” poor tired Mama working fingers to the bone.
Working class cottages, no gingerbread trim no turrets, no parquet floors, nothing to restore except strength so the body can work soundness so the mind can continue in a top-down society where Queen Annes become gentrified and the workers run down, painted ladies wait at the table while servants sweep the floor
But working class cottages still stand in rows of solidarity; a comforter of many colors in a shelter against the storm, while the Victorian tiered fortresses adorn the National Registry---they cannot be altered, while the cottages adapt, evolve, diverse, united, and strong.
Diane Funston co-founded a women's poetry salon in San Diego, created a weekly poetry gathering in the high desert town of Tehachapi, CA and most recently has been the Yuba-Sutter Arts and Culture Poet-in-Residence for the past two years. It is in this role she created Poetry Square, a monthly online venue that features poets from all the world reading their work and discussing creative process. She has been published in Last Stanza, Synkronicity, California Quarterly, Whirlwind, San Diego Poetry Annual, Summation, Tule Review, Lake Affect Magazine, Meat for Tea, and other literary journals. Her first chapbook, “Over the Falls” was published this July 2022 from Foothills Publishing. Diane is also a visual artist in mosaic, wool felting, and collage. Her pieces have been in galleries in the Sacramento Valley.
Inner City Home, Rochester, New York
In the city of Frederick Douglas;
above the painful echoes
of Underground Railroad,
below the path of the drinking gourd,
Young men kill one another
gun down hard fought ideals
give power to the new Master,
the meth and the crack
across young backs
like the forebear's whipped lashes
tracks on arms trace
new cruel slavery.
Across Harriet Tubman's land,
violence is the new crop
sticks to souls like cotton,
to scarred hands once before
reaching out to God,
now to the weapons
of class destruction.
Under city street lights
the call and response
of gunshots to sirens
penetrate the humid air,
color the night red,
flow of youthful blood---
glow of screaming top light---
Another night's statistic
in the city of Frederick Douglas.
Diane Funston
Yearly Visit Home
The smoke-hued vinyl window shades
half-mast once again,
Every annual visit, olive drapes, old furniture,
1970's in all but rebellion.
Behind the shades is Technicolor.
Bold. Alive. Beckoning.
Photos on the wall, my kids' grade-school pictures.
Dogs of hers that have passed,
replaced with dogs that look the same.
To move them would betray lighter wallpaper.
People say, "Your Mom is just getting older".
I remember her always like this.
Afraid to risk. To change. To do it differently.
I go out everyday, drink in the city.
Hear what's changed, what hasn't.
Drive through the green lake country.
I arrive back, tv blaring, always watching the weather.
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