The Laughter Lessons
Once upon a time there was a beautiful
Painting a scene of seven flowers
Wading in the grassy sea
And I the youngest
Not yet a face open to the sky
jostling against the cautious
Movements of family
Listening to the sounds
Others cannot hear.
One voice wrapped me,
In white skin with it’s cracked hands,
Held my cheek to it’s chest: a covered cage
Where she kept her heart—
Safely returned from exile.
The round pink child-flower resting against
The powder flesh and steel-feeling bones
listening to the sounds of the ancient souls hiding there
hearing the ageless sounds of home and learning them
By heart.
Knife blades slice through purple onion
And thump the boards
teaching her heart how to pound,
Rice and water scrape the bottom of the pot
demonstrating a perfect whisper,
the flat iron on cotton and steam—
the art of the sigh,
salt inside it’s shaker:
instruction on silence,
a measuring spoon digging into a deep of coffee grounds:
gives growling instructions,
at last it is safe to open enough in
splashing water against a petaline flesh—
her favorite lesson—
the sound of laughter.
Dear Grandpa,
I wrote this for you.
It is a poem about the sounds that remind me of grandma. In
reflecting I realize I can still hear her laughter… because it is the sound
against which I measure all laughter to test if it is true.
Sometimes I measure things against the things she did
things: the way she cooked, loved me and scolded the world around her taught me
what it meant to cook, love, or recognize a certain kind of injustice.
I know I am the only one in our family who knew her to be so
selfless with me. She gave me permissions to do things that no one else was
allowed to do. I was free to come and go and speak and laugh. Whatever she said
or did about me, however much she worried about me, the memories are distilled
now so that all I remember is her strident desire to raise me up, above all the
chaos and fear, to push me so I would go farther than either of us could
imagine.
I’m sorry I can’t be with you tomorrow to hold your hand as
you march boldly into this next adventure of life without her here on earth. My
adult hand would feel strange inside of yours. I would much rather you remember
the way my hands felt in yours when we used to take walks. This journey into
the next chapter of your life will be much easier if you remember what it feels
like to have those little fingers in your grasp. My hands (much like my face) are
much more like grandma’s were when she was an exhausted and overworked mother
of three-they will only remind you of hardship.
The work I am doing now keeps me away from you but I do it
because I know it is what grandma taught me to do.
We are with you in spirit though, me and grandma… just
giggling through the reel of memories that plays like our favorite movies in
our heads-over and over!
I love you endlessly.
Your Perlita
