My Grandmother’s House
The house still stands On East Union Street.

The house still stands

On East Union Street.

The ochre bricks and

Local limestone,

The concrete steps

That crumpled with time.

It is still there.

The porch where The Twins

Would carry out the

Horsehair couch and smoke

Because cigarettes were not

Allowed in the house.

There was a time when

We would build lions out of

Snow and perch them

On the copings.

 

It is smaller than I remember

But everything is smaller now.

It wasn’t unusual that my grandfather

Slept in the summer kitchen

And sat on the back porch

At midnight

(Because cigarettes were not

Allowed in the house).

It wasn’t strange that

My grandmother’s new television

Sat on top of her old one.

It was just so.

 

The air raid siren

In the city lot would roar

From behind her sagging

Clothesline and

Weeping willow.

Megaphones of Golden Gate

red rang every

Cold War morning,

Calling the farmer’s

Children home for breakfast.

“Fear is a silly thing”

It would sing,

“But there is a song for it.”

 

My grandmother, in her ruffled smock

Still dusted with flour and

Smelling like fresh rolls,

Would wipe the butter

From her fingers

And release a loud “Whoop!”

Because my grandfather could only

Hear the higher notes.

In her kitchen we have rules.

Politics and religion are

For the living room,

Lamb is for the

Dinner table.

 

My father was born in

The house around the corner.

He was the oldest

And the last one left.

How does a mother live

Through the deaths

Of three children?

There is a magical line of

Concrete around the family

Plot in the graveyard.

The footing for a house

The dead could never build.

But it keeps the ghosts

In the ground.

 

You can find a name

Carved on the back of

My father’s headstone.

It is my name.

If my children

need an inscription

In granite to lay

Flowers on my head,

They should lay them

With my father.

My body will be ashes

Scattered across the desert,

But my name is here.