My kid was six, sick— feverish.
One cheek had become a mump. I knew,
in a few hours, there might be two of them.
Loretta, the Jamaican cook (really, a Jamaican shaman)
intervened with gifts—a white gull-feather
and a covered jar of “proof rum” (denatured
alcohol). Dip the feather in the rum.
Feather his mump, and no new ones will come.
 
I thanked her.  But the magic objects slipped
my mind. I left them, untouched, on the table. Next
morning, Malcolm woke as foretold—fully mumped.
Loretta eyed the unopened liquor jar,
the futile feather, and the child, saying
not a word to his pale and clueless mother.