Memento
Elizabeth N. Flores
October 27, 2024
As the family gathered
two weeks after their
mother’s funeral
to go through her belongings,
the eldest son claimed
only one keepsake,
her voter registration card
she let him hand to
“Miss Dolly,
the precinct lady”
when he was eight.
Can we recall when we first
represented our family in
public, and did it well?
The eldest son could.
That October morning
in 1992, accompanying his
mother to the early voting van
stationed in the parking lot
of the nursery and floral shop
a block from their house.
When Miss Dolly returned the card
to him to give to his mother,
it was as if the two ladies
had come to an unspoken agreement
that he was worthy of trust,
a feeling he carried with him
each time he voted
in all the years that followed.
Elizabeth N. Flores, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, taught for over 40 years at Del Mar College and was the college’s first Mexican American Studies Program Coordinator. Her poems have appeared in the Texas Poetry Assignment, Corpus Christi Writers (2022 and 2023 editions) anthologies edited by William Mays, the Mays Publishing Literary Magazine, and the Windward Review.
