You are not here.
I can not touch you.
I can no longer walk between
the two peonies on my way to
your porch.
The peonies are there, but it is no longer
your house.
How many times did I mow that lawn?  
Keep it tight to the tree,
round and round the peonies.
Good boy J.J.
God how I hated that nickname.

I see you now,
at your desk in the corner,
pall mall burning
in your shoe shaped ashtray,
crossword puzzle folded neatly
and your glasses half on your nose.

You were the toughest woman I know.

" Was ist los, Wer ist da?"

"It's me Gram"

I'd come around the corner and you would look at me over your glasses.
I could always tell what I was gonna get from you by the looks on your face.  
None of us have poker faces.

Even if I got the head shake of disapproval, there was always a hint of a smile, a smirk.
I know I was your favorite.
I got away with ******.
  
In your grey stuccoed rooms
I found my sexuality,
I tried to end my life,
I cried,
I ******,
I watched others battle until bloodied
and
I fought many
of my own battles
in front of your fireplace.
I saw a family blossom,
unfolding layer after layer
of beauty,
death,
secrets
and joy.

I saw strong men crumble in your dining room.

Countless were the times I would hang around on the fringes of conversations,
unobtrusive, but ever observant I was.
I learned so much from your phone calls, your conversations.

I think of when I have been the happiest
and it was when I was being tucked in by you
up in the king room.

My belly full,
freshly bathed,
the smell of avon's skin-so-soft,
clean sheets
and the softest pillows
in the world.
I was safe.
I was loved.

Waking up to
bacon and
french toast and
apple butter and
captain kangaroo and
your creaky stairs,
I have never had it as good as that.
You made the best french toast ever.

And then I got older and taller.
My marks on the measuring wall kept creeping up and up.
I got closer to
uncle mikes and
butch and...
was big jim on there?

I grew into a ****** little teenager,
I went from asking you for candy money,
to concert tshirt money
to bail money.
Through it all, you were there for me.
I would show up,
head down and repentant,
ready for my berating.
I wonder how different my life would have been had you not been around
as long as you were?

That day when my dad
came and took me
when I didn't want to go,
I kept looking back
and crying for you,
You said it always broke your heart, that look.

That was my introduction to manipulation.

It was in your basement
I found the steaming remains of debauchery.
I met most of my demons
for the first time
in the shadows
of the mighty sycamores
on Lincoln Boulevard.

You are not here.
I can not touch you.
You died and we fell apart, all of us.
We barely hang on,
it seems.
Your children squabble and flounder still.
Alliances formed
and broken
and rediscovered again.
Silly, this constant ebb and flow of intimacy.
Blood is thick, right?

We are doing ok though, I promise.
You would be so proud of us, I swear.

Our kids are happy
and we teach them words
like deetdeedles and shoisel.
I still make french toast your way
and Anne's house has the measuring wall.

I still do crosswords,
I love words, because of you.
I write, I  live, thanks to you.

The willow tree is gone
but the peonies are still there.

Ich leibe dich, Gramma.

I am trying to remember your tattoos
and I cannot.
You had a goddess on your calf,
but which one?
There are the vines that started on your ankles,
I think,
and wound up your strong legs,
traveled the curve of your hip,
to where?
Or did they begin on your arms?

****, I should know this.

I remember the heart on your ***,
the mermaid on your chest,
the rocket ship, somewhere.

I spent so many hours looking at these tattoos
I should know them as well as my own body.

I don't though.

The edges blur away
into skin
and elbows
and smells
and sounds
and feelings.

When I try to think of your body
I feel my hand tracing the curve of your back.

I smell amber and wine.

A fertility goddess on the shoulder,
laughing and tumbling
out of bed together in a
breathless heap.

Crime scenes, willow leaves on your neck.
Drawings by Luke, a rocket, a cat, and was there a heart in there?

I should know this.

I tried to memorize them on so many nights.

I should ******* know this.

The lilies on your arm, I can taste your stomach.
I tried to look back at the captured moments.
Never once did I think,
take pictures of all her tattoos,
one day you wont be able to remember them.

One day you will not be welcome to look or touch.

I can remember every curve of your body.
I remember every fold,
every scar.
I can feel your soft feet and your stubble covered legs
I would not want any other way.

But...I can't see you baby,
I can't see you.

How many times
did my hands roam your canvas?
How many times did I long to be the ink
in your skin?
I wanted you to
take my pain and make it yours,
carry me around with you,
as you.
I wanted you to blend our pain
and make it something beautiful.

I can hear your voice,
the one I thought you
used
just for me.

The stain of you covers me and I just want this taste out of my mouth.

I was going to write a poem

about the distance
I walk
girls to their cars.
You know, to the door?
down the stairs to the front porch?
out to the first step for that last, awkward hug?
do I really like them?
Am I concerned for their safety
or is this just
the obligatory,
socially and culturally
acceptable
distance for me to walk with this particular individual?

Did I even get out of bed?
Is the distance I walk directly proportional to the amount of feelings I have for that person at that time?
Or does time of day or night play into it?

Do I actually walk them
all the way
down the hill
to where they are allowed to park,
if they are a one nighter but it is 3 a.m.?

Or perhaps to the end of my lawn,
at the opening of my small,
rickety,
barely noticed
fence,
which keeps nothing in or out,
to hold them so tight that they know,
they just know

with every molecule in their essence

that I am theirs,

all of me,

and that I do not want them
to leave
but if they must,
I shall be waiting

eagerly

with every molecule of my essence

to breathe them in again,
to feel them near me again,
to smell their sweat again?  

I was going to write about that.
But then I thought,
why not write about your plants?

I realized the other day,
while watering my various plants,
six in total,
that all of them had been given to me.

They were all gifts.

By women.

My dear mother,
both of my  beautiful sisters,
two  rotten ex-girlfriends of mine,
and a kickass lesbian friend
I met through somebody
that got walked to the front porch.

Surely
there must be a poem
in there somewhere, I thought.
With all the females
and the ***
and the plants
and soil
and life

and all that other *******,

surely
I must be able
to conjure up

something beautiful,
something wonderful
and profound
and bewildering
and inspiring

and all that other *******,

but sadly for you
dear reader,
all I could come up with

was this *******
you just read.

The good thing is,
I didn't write this for you.
I wrote this for me.
I have to.

These people
They do not even see me.
they are blind to me
I am not invisible
I walk by them
I see them
they don't see me
they look away
look at the floor
they look around
they look anywhere
but my eyes

which is fine
for if they did
they would see
the eyes of a madman
a lover
a father and a brother
a ***** hobo
a ragged lonely nomad
a slave
a tree climber
a ruiner
a fighter
a healer
a *****

They would see centuries upon centuries of amber and curry and garlic and sand and bones

If they dared
to step a little closer
they would smell the *** and soil of a thousand worlds
the blood
the ****
the tears
of a million little girls and boys left in my wake
lilies and lilacs and roses and daffodils would mix with
mangoes and dragons blood
and sweaty lust.

I am Love and I walk among you.