Regular Poem: Granny House

People apologize

for leaving behind their
things, belongings, accoutrements,
but I’ve grown accustomed
to the custom
and the customary
stuff.
I have pieces of your china
and pieces of your heart
along with me,
smells of you and
sounds of you
to adorn the wood paneling.

It wouldn’t be
a granny house
without echoes
shadows
of all the former residents.
The nature of a granny house
is not transitory or nomadic
but a constant
in the lives of its
transitory nomadic
inhabitants.

It carries the weight
in its tiles
embraces in its carpet
remembers in its dust.

To be the woman
living in the
granny house
is to be the bearer
of history–
like a scribe or bard
but of things and feelings.

One doesn’t choose a granny house life.
One is chosen
by the house itself
evaluated
on the merits of her own
granny ways
tested and tried,
given riddles and enigmas and clogged drains
until the point of death
and found

granny enough
to shoulder
an old house
and its ghosts.

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