She Sat in Autumn
My grandmother sat in autumn
Shelling pecans at the
kitchen table.
At mid afternoon
The children were at play in
the yard;
Parents, at work.
She made herself useful
Preparing a sack of pecans
That would go to candies and
pies
Destined for holiday
enjoyment.
Her fingers remained nimble
Though hands were darkened
By age spots;
Skin wrinkled by
Time and duty.
She thinks back to younger
days
(My childhood heart knew
nothing of her sorrow).
So many years a widow,
She wonders what might have been
If that fiery Irishman, ten
years her senior,
Had only had a stronger
heart.
She hurts for her son –
The favored one –
Whose life spiraled into
alcohol and bitterness.
“How did you keep yourself
whole
And loving,” I asked, as the
observer
In this autumn-tinted
memory,
“So that all I ever saw as a
child
Was gladness and light?”
“I
had to welcome what life brought,”
Her thin fingers grasped the
nutcracker
To loose another autumn
kernel,
“I
had to be here to shell pecans.”
~ Charles Kinnaird
Image: "Grandmother Michaud in Silhouette"
Artist: Edouard Vuillard – 1890
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden – Washington DC
Medium:Oil on cardboard
Medium:Oil on cardboard
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