Grandmother

Oh, but where
among brown flakes, bitter
dirty-draw bits, brown memories
of Formica, ivory yellowed
where my mother was a child, younger than I am now.

Small kitchen, ceramic white-blue stove
Cockroaches tippertapped, all echoes now
ever cold, ever flickering, skeletal
like when she lay dying, too weak
transparenting to dust, like her
English. Birth home away, light years,
Alpine.

Oh, but where
was love, sour soup, and rye,
Bakelite sparks, a lost house
from my infanthood, forty-Watt yellowed
recollection of where my mother was a child, younger than I am now.

© Mark Sheeky. Permission is required for reproduction.