Ritual

winter morning memory

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~for my grandfather

He is waiting, sitting

quietly beside the small wood stove —

today, burning coal,

turned roaring-orange red.

Two old and wrinkled hands

hold a little girls dress,;

being warmed by the fire

that he built – kindling, coal-

stoked for good measure.

He’s been up for hours

by the time I slide from bed,

go to stand by the stove —

slip on the warm clothes.

Every winter morning —

this act of quiet love,

repeated as ritual

Until spring comes again and

the stove grows cold.

~November 2011

Ritual

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Ritual
~for Julia, in memoria

On this Lily-white
silent Sunday she
combs one hundred times
the strands of pony-grey,
streaked-aged mane
of ninety-two years,
pulls it back tightly
into an outdated bun.

Liquid-blue-petal eyes
shift, stare sadly down
at purple-viened hands
lain gently across cloth,
placid in a lap
of sagging flesh
and weak-white bone.

Old Southern sighs resignation
as generations gather
around the chair
to celebrate ancient,
another birthday.

Their debt of homage
paid in presence, ordered
by size and height around
the matriarchal chair.

Time-ticks every face older
into a mist of memory
becoming dreams —
as death comes
she remembers the future–

ball gown of tangerine silk
flowing, she dances
times distorted promenade.

The children will turn,
burn old candles,
forget,
and live forward.

~Summer 2011, South Carolina
Photography Prints