The Search

The Search
Eileen Apperson


"The trees," my daughter pointed to
as we landed in a New England Autumn,
"the colors look like Fruit Loops."

I was there to finger through dank
parish records, step among
grave markers, relocate homesteads gone
for two hundred years. And I don't know
why I brought her along. She pulled
on my shirt and begged, "can we go home?"

Perhaps because she does not know her own
grandparents, only that the Roseville pottery
belonged to Grandma and those button-up
baby shoes once fit Grandpa's feet.

***

Eileen received an MA in creative writing with an emphasis in nonfiction prose and an MFA in poetry from CSU, Fresno. She teaches creative nonfiction, composition, and literature at Reedley College. Recent publications include the Platte Valley Review, The Packinghouse Review, The Mom Egg, Writing It Real, and Kaleidowhirl. Eileen’s latest writing project is in fact an old one as she has dusted-off the pages of a 10-year old manuscript and is working with a documentary film maker to bring her vision of landscape and memory to the screen. Genealogy research has been an obsession of Eileen’s since she was twelve when she inherited her grandmother’s letters.