This is What is Invisible

grooveamatic
grooveamatic Posts: 1,374
edited November 2008 in Poetry, Prose, Music & Art
In the upper small bedroom
I’d watch cartoons while she fiddled around
downstairs, doing grandma-type things,
while I waited to walk to school,
waited for Mom or Dad to get home,
or waited for things now lost to time;
she’d bring me food which I no longer
remember, and cool red drinks
with sugar in them, and when I explored
her house I found amazing things
which clearly showed the difference
between a grandma and a little boy:
swatches of fabric, long-stemmed sturdy matches,
sepia photos of men in tall hats,
endless paintings of a bearded man, praying.

Grandma’s stuff took up a lot of space,
for there must have been a lot that Grandma loved,
and in each room of her small house
her biography could have been written
from tiny items and trinkets in shoeboxes
and larger, unknown things propped in closets.
As Grandpa sat shaking in his wheelchair,
Grandma’s long life followed her around
the dark living room as she gave him pills
and water through a huge straw.
There was a lot that Grandma loved
(this is what is invisible).
I never knew her like I should have.

Today I helped carry her the last few feet
her body will ever move; she wasn’t heavy,
as I imagine her and the things she loved
must have been truly carried elsewhere,
like the Pastor said.
I rubbed my own mother’s back and timed
my breath to hers, hoping to calm her
if she needed calming, hoping to know her
like I should.

After the last car left, they must have lowered
Grandma, lowered her into what is invisible.
.........................................................................
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • chadwick
    chadwick up my ass Posts: 21,157
    very vivid
    deeply moving
    nicely done

    thank you for sharing with us
    for poetry through the ceiling. ISBN: 1 4241 8840 7

    "Hear me, my chiefs!
    I am tired; my heart is
    sick and sad. From where
    the sun stands I will fight
    no more forever."
    Chief Joseph - Nez Perce
  • justam
    justam Posts: 21,415
    It sounds like you loved your grandma. :)
    &&&&&&&&&&&&&&
  • Bu2
    Bu2 Posts: 1,693
    grooveamatic wrote:

    As Grandpa sat shaking in his wheelchair,
    Grandma’s long life followed her around
    the dark living room as she gave him pills
    and water through a huge straw.
    There was a lot that Grandma loved
    (this is what is invisible).
    I never knew her like I should have.

    That bit about her long life following her around is really striking. Excellent poem, bittersweet sad and very moving.
    Feels Good Inc.

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