When I was a child, I loved staying at Grandma’s house. I packed my suitcase and lugged it up the creaky stairway to the alcove bedroom with the framed print of the alley cat whose huge eyes glowed in the dark. Crisp morning breezes carried the sweetness of lilacs and bird song through the open window. Grandma didn’t play with us so much as let us tag along as she did her chores. We clamored to help gather fallen apples for a pie, knead bread, or feed laundry through her old-fashioned wringer. She never cut us a break when we played games.
It didn’t matter if you were six or sixteen, if you misspelled a word in Scrabble, she would challenge you and you would lose your turn. She had the patience of Job, fielding our questions all day without a trace of irritation. When I pointed to a ceramic jar on the bathroom counter and asked what ‘Chopper Hopper’ meant, she told me choppers were teeth and a hopper was a place to keep them. “C’mon, Grandma, you can’t put teeth in a jar!” I said, certain she was pulling my leg. I about flipped when she opened it and showed me Grandpa’s dentures. At bath time, I told her I didn’t want my hair shampooed; I had sounded out the words on the bottle and was convinced that a product called ‘Hurr-ible Essence’ would smell bad. Her rosary resided in an elegant plastic box whose lid was a statuette of the Holy Family. Across the front it said, “The family that prays together, stays together,” which
I solemnly repeated every time I retrieved it for her. My fascination with reading everything in her house must have driven her bananas.
GRANDMA MARGARET
(Elegy in Ghazal)
Her gentle brown eyes lit up just for me, my grandma
Her hugs were warm and soft and bosomy, my grandma
She stoked the basement woodstove, did her gardening
in a proper dress and hose—always a lady, my grandma
She turned every chore into fun: chopping up vegetables,
making beds or bread, hanging out laundry, my grandma
In card and Scrabble games, she did not pander to us kids;
she played hard, made us beat her honestly, my grandma
She churned out snickerdoodles and homemade noodles
and jars of tiny pickles, as sweet as could be, my grandma
She knew a mourning dove’s cry, made snapdragons talk,
shook down fruit for us from her apple tree, my grandma
When I tossed a Nerf ball in the toilet, talked too much, or
toppled a houseplant, she never grew angry, my grandma
On her Singer, she sewed clothing and puppets and quilts,
and hundreds of pairs of mittens for charity, my grandma
She even made me a black baby doll, hair done up in braids
Provider of my first lesson in racial diversity, my grandma
Each night, she prayed for world peace and those in need,
counting Hail Marys on her worn rosary beads, my grandma
I’m fifty and childless and live in sweatpants and sneakers,
but inside, where it counts, I shall one day be my grandma
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