Marissa Schwalm
Oral Tradition
When I was young I loved the story of my mother breaking her sister's arm. Then I was without siblings and thought this must be what they do. I loved the idea of them both bouncing high on the big bed of their parents, a secret moment kept only for when they were alone. I could see my mother flying up and down in a stream of colors her brown skin, her tomboy hair, the overused, stained clothes. With excitement I would wait for the good part: small hands slamming into younger sister, screams, blood, staring at the bone that found its way through skin. My inquisitiveness was religious: I wanted to punish her with memories again and again.
Marissa Schwalm is an English, Composition, and Creative Writing teacher for a high school in Massachusetts. She also has had the joy and challenge to have previously taught middle school. Marissa received her MFA in Creative Writing from Chatham University in Pittsburgh, PA. She has published one chapbook, The Corresponding Divergent, been published in an anthology, as well as in journals. She currently is learning the ways of New England, with her two dogs and cat.
