Hydrangeas

[Hydrangeas, Grafton MA, Oct. 4]

CA let me take some hydrangea cuttings from the shrub in front of her house last weekend since I missed her "hydrangea festival" a couple of weeks before. One year a neighbor of hers confessed that he and his partner used to sneak over to the house, when it belonged to the previous owner, to clip hydrangeas to save and dry for their Christmas decorations. They owned a small bed & breakfast down the street and decorated it in lush, gorgeous style for the holidays. I believe they spray-painted the dried hydrangeas with gold paint, but I don't remember whether they hung them on the tree or used them in some other fashion. Anyway, CA discovered and bought her house after staying at their B&B, so they were on good enough terms to walk over and help themselves to clippings without sneaking, though I wonder if it was as much fun.

I like them best on the tree, in their various shades of fall blush.

9:35:33 PM      trackback [] 

Antonina

This was inspired by the vernacular body’s “archaeology of childhood: food” series. I actually submitted it and Elck returned it to me with thanks, kind words, and the suggestion that I resubmit it longer – it seems I misread the rules: it requires a length of 550 words, which I read as 150 words! Whoops. Well, since I’m temperamentally given to brevity and since I’m happy with this length for this poem, I’ll leave it as is and perhaps consider something different for the series or for another of his intriguing projects.

Go read the pieces in the series so far!

* Susan’s “Egg”

* Elck’s own “Wolfish”

* Suzanne’s “Out beyond kenship” (which particularly inspired me with her tale of mushroom hunting with her Lithuanian grandmother; mine was Polish)

* The introduction and rules are here.

And my own brief poem inspired by the series:

Antonina

 

Once, when I was a child, I ate soup

from the steaming bowl she set before me

on the dinette tabletop I could only see

from a chair piled high with cushions.

 

Sets it before me between her fists,

then wipes them on the flowered apron

around her waist, the back of one fist

pushing a pale curl off her face,

 

she shoos the cat from the bowl beneath

the pantry bench exuding smells of potato

and carrot peelings, the onionskins for dying

Easter eggs the color of my soup bowl.

 

Soon she will lose the neurons needed

to maneuver the pot she stirs on the stove

in her kitchen’s center, its licks of flame

stifled under the black iron disks.

 

But now she lets me lift the bust-half

off her porcelain cookie jar, a tough but breakable

maid-servant that splits herself in two

to offer sweets to grandchildren.

 

Note: In an attempt to be less obscure than I usually am, I should mention that my grandmother died of ALS when I was five years old. Perhaps I should revise to be more clear?

 

7:10:05 PM      trackback [] 

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