Guardian
For
Grandmother Isabel (who died young)
By day, I study the movements of popular girls
pour myself into their laughing tones—
at night, linger till the water grows cold.
A day spent holding loneliness at bay,
and now, sweet as a courtesy soap,
I hug my mother good-night, watch my image fail
in the picture window, listen to the rhythm—
feet padding across the linoleum
then muffled on the hardwood,
now silent across the rug to my bed.
I touch the frame of her portrait.
A piece of night slips past the curtains,
sightless, unspoken—
One moment a breeze the next her voice
I love you no matter what.
Every night: this trailing loss of thought and language,
then the merging: her body light as a summer sheet
passing through me, our weight
settling into my back and legs
into the sheets, the mattress, my floor,
down through the basement
and into the rich, untouched earth
where our bodies crumble like humus
and sleep remembers our two lives as one.
Copyright © 2008 Jane Olmsted