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Grandmother On My Mother's Side

 

Ceci more than most

knew the art of the drop-by chat

how to match topics like mockingbird songs

and salt a tease into the stock of praise

the seven speeds of knowing winks

how essential the pause when taking leave

 

Her hands knew gentle generosities

soup made early to simmer

embroidery for a gift next year

how children at the window with PB&J faces 

love squirrels on the porch with PB&J faces

and how such timing took ballet finesse

 

She lost her husband, and everyone agreed to say

it was a hunting mishap

knew how the heart’s sap and tragedy

catch each other unaware

amber their moment slowly

and then forever

 

She knew when children suffer

they plant what they want to bury

hope rain never summons deeper seeds

but storms fall hard in the summer

 

She knew the frailty of live oaks

how only wind walks on the water

at the foot of Jackson Avenue

 

She knew and perhaps too well

to keep plenty of tea in her kitchen

She knew the magnificent fragility of time

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