She raised good vegetables,
Named the barn cat Bluebell,
But never let it come inside,
Swept her husband's shoulders clean
Of sawdust every weekday evening,
And Saturdays at noon.

He always called her mubber,
With obvious delight
That she had been persuaded
To choose him eventually
To father my father,
When times were lean.

She passed out chewing gum at church
To restless children,
Planted flowers and discouraged weeds,
And showed my father's only son
The way to stitch a toy horse--
Blue scrap cloth, foot-pedaled machine.

Smell of woodsmoke winter evenings
Makes me smile through tears,
As Peterson's piano
Knocks out C Jam Blues,
And that old horse
Sits sideways on the mantle.

March saw yellow flowers grow
And I transplanted them
Beneath the pines that lined the drive,
Amid advice they might not grow,
Which would have been the case,
Had she not watered them.

When someone leaves, their feet go first,
And she was there to see him go
Beside those flowers inbetween
Knotty pines and stacked firewood,
To lie in wait, outside of time,
Outside of spoken words.

The melting snow, the most in years,
Gives way now to those flowers,
Or the children of those flowers.