weathered roots

1. unknown
2. again
3. migratory
4. driftwood
5. pressed

unknown -

in my family there is some confusion
over who my great grandfather was -
two men listed in alternating frequency
on census records,
like two branches grown too close together
their fruit can't be separated,
and so in respect for my unknowing
i whisper my love to the cardinal,
and to the raven, and every spare sparrow
that roosts on my windowsill,
i could be stingy with my affection,
but this is easier isn't it?
to love them all until they leave,
to watch my love take flight,
to accept in the unknowing,
maybe there's grace
caught in the whisper
of an appalachian lullaby
ringing in my grandfather's
newborn ears.

again -

it surprises me in the autumn,
when squash vines push out of the soil
in the place their ancestors were buried -

i've been told, after all
that they're meant to complete
their whole life cycle in a year,
live and die and end -

but sometimes seeds are left over,
sometimes the winter is less bitter,
sometimes death is not the end -

it surprises me in the autumn,
how i still think of generations
i've never met, how i hear them
in my dreams

i've been told, after all
the dead do not speak,
but here we are carrying on
like old friends, laughing together -

and sometimes the seeds left over,
carried through the winter, are stronger
because we've weathered death and lived.

migratory -

you were always the heirloom, that didn't fit -
too hard to explain these broken edges,
i spent years, trying to forget that you were ever here,
it isn't hard to forget the ones that refuse to stay

but then i would find your missing place again;
and your absence became the muse i couldn't catch
darting, running, flying - and lost again
i would find myself absentmindedly following
the imprint of your ghost-steps, round and round,
like a map i couldn't read, but was bound to follow

i don't treasure you, but i do not keep your memory lightly.
for i know those broken edges have a tendency to snap.
and i have a broken-hearted tendency to hold too tightly
the bird that has to fly.

driftwood -

twenty-thousand-and-one leagues under the sea,
i'd follow you until we'd catch the sun.

pressed -

decades ago, my grandmother
picked a collection of leaves and flowers
to press between two panes of glass,
so that their beautiful colors might be preserved
for another year,
i sometimes imagine these pressed flowers
were picked for me, that maybe she -
in sweet gardening instinct
wanted to preserve a little love
to be kept through the winter,
that maybe she imagined a granddaughter
tracing the veins in dried leaves,
and tracing them back to her.

each year the colors fade a little more,
and sometimes i fear i'll wake to find
only dust beneath the glass,
that my meager memories
will have faded dark, and
we both will have forgotten each other.

a few years ago, in loving urgency,
i scoured my mother's own garden,
for flowers that looked like her mother's -
and together we placed them between glass
to save for another year,
and i promise
to teach my daughters,
to teach their daughters
to do the same,
if only so that they may trace their hands
along weathered veins, and remember
the world is beautiful, and desperate
with love that weathers on.