Petrified House - Kate Campbell

She sees the world through yellowing lace

The world hasn’t seen her since seventy-eight

Except for the nephew who used to look in

To bring her, her chocolate and tonic and gin

She lives in one room of a mansion downtown

With nothing but strip bars and strip malls around

It used to be three miles to those big stone gates

'Til property taxes just whittled it away

She believes somehow that nothing has changed

Even though Sherman left Georgia in flames

Cotton’s still king and the south didn’t fall

As long as wisteria climbs up the wall

She won’t read the paper and won’t watch the news

She thinks it’s all lies made up by New York Jews

Her daddy said no matter what the laws say

Down here we’ve always done things our own way

Some day that petrified house will fall down

Like everything it will return to the ground

Whatever it stood for will all be condensed

To one paragraph on a plaque by the fence