Tonight's Poet Corner: Sammy Lee Fits

Sammy Lee Fits
by Belinda Roddie

She played banjo on Fridays,
accordion on Saturdays,
and a little bit of harpsichord
at the church on Sundays. She
smoked a cigarette when she
tinkered with the notes and puffed
each syllable out of her left nostril,
like the whistle of a steam train
tumbling down the far side of town
on rickety, rackety rails.

They called her Sammy Lee Fits,
because her knees would get the shakes
as she played, bouncing and rattling
so the floor squeaked beneath her old
rattlesnake boots. In between tunes,
she drank enough rum and chewed
enough bubble gum to suffocate a cow
sweltering in the Appalachian August.
And everyone loved her.
But none so much as

Buddy Ferret and his sister Janey,
who drew straws and broke wishbones
on their dinner plates in the saloon
to see who would get to sing a duet
with Fits and who would get to dance
the two-step with her when  her fingers
got too sore to rub the strings or
kiss the keys anymore. It was all heat
and harmony on the weekends,
when people got the chance to hear
a real musical dame on the tightrope
between Alabama and Tennessee,
the pickled smile a favorite
to behold when the songs got spicy
enough to be served with whiskey.