her hold on me -

So she will sit in Central Park,
sometime in the sixties,
with legs curled as a calligraph,
and hair bound with a scarf,
and arms pressing down,
to hold the earth,

a young Grace,
with green eyes.

Or she will tum the faulted corner
with a word like phyllo or duerme,
and I will see her absorbed with Maria,
brushing her hair back
in a Puerto Rican spell.

She was not a woman who would ever dance alone.

I wondered at one point,
had someone spirited her away,
told her things
that we were never meant to hear,
so did she,
unwittingly,
bake them into her breads,
ladle them into our bowls,
scent her golden hair with whispers.

That would explain much.

Why there was a chill when she left a room.

Quiet when she tired of things.

Safety in her arms and the sound of her Spanish,
the mother tongue I never learned.

The balance of her love was heavy on this heart,
and marks me to this day.

Children must grow,
though I never thought myself
the child.






GLS
8.7.96