The DNA results 

Revealed some aspects 

Of whom I am 

Where I am from 

 

But not everything 

Was revealed 

And much of my history 

Remains hidden 

 

My father was from Yakima 

Ran away to the Bay Area 

Where he became a college professor 

Taught the dismal science economics 

 

Along the way  

He met my mother 

And after a whirlwind romance 

had four children 

 

My older brother, 

Me 

Younger brother 

And sister 

 

She was a refugee 

From the dust bowl 

Fled Arkansas 

In the late ’30s  

 

Never looked back 

Settled down  

In the Bay Area 

Yet the south lingered on  

 

She trained herself  

To speak without an accent 

The only time the southern came out 

Was when she was talking to her sisters 

 

She was the 10th of 11th children 

Father was a moonshiner 

A Cherokee medicine man to boot 

Lived life in the Ozark mountains 

 

She had two sons 

From a prior relationship 

That went south 

We never really knew them  

 

My father was an atheist 

And a morning person 

And a man with a  plan 

For everything 

 

My mother 

More make it up 

As she went along 

And a night owl 

 

How and why 

They met and stayed together 

Is beyond me 

They had a stormy relationship 

 

My mother always said 

Germans and Irish 

Don’t mix  

And never should marry 

 

She also said 

The world is divided into morning people 

And night owls 

And they are doomed to marry each other 

 

Yet I suppose 

There was real love 

Beneath all the drama 

And bluster