Spelling Bee Poem by Chocolate Waters

That awful photograph.
14, worst case of acne
in the United States.
My very best dress,
midnight-blue organdy
poofing out at the bottom like a bell;
Matching glasses - speckled blue,
they looked like a
Chrysler hood ornament.

'These are the faces of a champion, '
proclaimed the words underneath
that photo on the front page of the Lancaster Intelligencer Journal,
as Miss ________ Waters
- aha - you thought I was going to
tell you what my mother named me, didn't you? -
takes home the 1963
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania
Spelling Bee Championship.'

Another photo in the paper that morning -
me and my three younger siblings:
Vanilla, Butterscotch and Strawberry.
OK - Bobby, Gary and Tena.
Munchkins then, no taller than tree stumps,
so proud of their big sister -
they liked me in that moment,
they really really liked me.
Pauline and Emory beaming as proud parents will.

And the accolades!
Boisterous applause!
Standing ovation!
The look of unmitigated astonishment
on my first cousin's face -
Marion Kay - just a swinger then,
grown up to be muscle-bound Marion
the Barbarian weightlifter.

And the prizes!
A transistor radio!
A heart-shaped plaque
(which I thought could've
been a little bigger) .
A complete 23-volume set of the Encyclopedia Britannica!
Dad promised me 50 cents for every 1,200-page
itsy-bitsy-teensy-weensy-printed volume that I read.
WOW!
And the promise of a steak dinner from my favorite teacher,
Mrs. Jessie Malmborg. Never delivered.
When you read this Mrs. Malmborg -
"I want that steak dinner! "

But, most excellent of all -
an every-expense-paid-for-week-long vacation
to the Capitol of the World, Washington, D.C.!
BY MYSELF!
Well no,
with the reporter from the Intel, Larry Bauman and
…mom.

So, the big bee in D.C. came.
My spelling bee teacher came.
The high school principal came.
Mrs. Malmborg did not come.

I flunked out in the third round.
The Intel reporter reported that I cried,
which I did not.
At least not then.
Later in my room at the Mayflower Hotel
I sobbed into the bathroom mirror,
gasping out every word of "Climb Every Mountain, "
Even getting Harry Truman's autograph in the lobby
of the Mayflower Hotel the day before
could not assuage my utter misery.
I was a failure, a flop, an enormous disenchantment.
How could I ever grow up to be President now?
I didn't even know that girls did NOT
grow up to be President - then.

Only word in the entire round of 67 words
I could not spell:
'ferret' -
the pronouncer said it was "furry."
It's not "furry."
It's a wormy, ratty
little weasel - descended from a polecat.
Don't people kill it with sticks?
Eat it in stew?
I spelled it with a "u."
And to this day I have never been able
to eat
ferret.