Spilt milk
Upon the kitchen stove,
And
Bread made from honey, could be found upon
My grandmother’s kitchen counter every day, as
She would sip her coffee,
Black and without sugar.
We connected
In a way in which no two people ever had,
My grandmother built a house of cards in which
We both lived from day to day,
Every day we spent together
After school I would arrive at her home and
She would offer me chocolates, stale, and filled with liqueur.
The dust thickly covering the coffee table didn’t bother me, and
Neither did the cracks running up and down the walls:
This to her was home,
A place where she could enjoy the seeds of life she
Planted, and watch them grow,
In her solitude
She would venture outward briefly every Monday to
Pick up a quart of milk, her cigarettes, and
Perhaps a bottle of port wine at the corner’s liquor store,
Or to go to church to attend a service or perhaps just to say a prayer,
Back in those days I would meet her there,
And together, we would return to her small and cluttered home.
I would tell her the darkest secrets of my life, as she shared hers with me,
Or we would shed some light on a rainy day,
Ridiculing certain television shows,
And singing old radio tunes, or
Even some that we had composed ourselves, not to
Be understood by anyone but the two of us.
Spilt milk upon the kitchen stove and honey cake
Were always present in Grandma’s kitchen.
On occasions a mouse would scurry across her tattered oriental rug.
Almost a cartoon character my grandmother was
Who donned her wig backwards and always was dressed in
Bright colors, wore crimson red lipstick and rouge,
And cheapened gold hoped earrings when she attended mass on Sundays.
Her home was really quite an intriguing place:
Hats festooned every corner, as well as
Chinese gowns that hung upon her bathroom’s door,
Pictures taken in the orient decorated every wall, as an
Effort to cover the cracked and peeling paint, that was
Falling in pieces, and were scattered about the floor.
Grandma passed away nearly sixteen years ago-
I can still hear the chiming of her
Grandfather clock and in the background, her beloved
Music box playing the enchanting tune
“Hi lily, hi lily hi lo…”
Many a friend I have lost in this life, and I do not believe in
Heaven or hell or even Limbo or Purgatory-
When I die I shall fall into a final sleep-
Although, if I could choose one person that I could see just one more time,
That has left this world, it would be Grandma,
For even the day before she died, she was still
Young in heart, soul and spirit, and
When I look up into the sky searching in vain for a heaven that does not exist-
I know she is still by my side,
Singing with me those special tunes we heard on the radio
Clad in her brightly colored floral printed frock,
Her wig worn backwards, and her lips painted crimson red.
I think of that mouse who darted across her living room that day, and
I burst into laughter-
And think how we both laughed until we cried- this is how I wish to remember her-
An eccentric, elderly lady whom I loved,
And who wasn’t ever old at all…

,
Claudia Krizay (schizoclaud)

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