A Tribute
On gray days like this one
The air thick and humid
We drive, circling the city streets
smoke winding before our eyes
Blinking:
Today, like many others,
I hug the park perimeter
lean right, steer across the bridge
and halt at the curb.
Inside the gray house
with the barren yard and stubby
crumbling stone wall
Grandma sits in an armchair.
Shades drawn, the light is a dark musty yellow.
She is pregnant.
There is no father like there is no lamp
Only the armchair in yellow light.
I don’t say a word
but take her to the hospital
–more like a super mall decked
in plastic palms, wishing fountains and grease.
Her room here has white linoleum floors
and a bed spread in white sheets.
It is dark, too
Except for the white glow peeking through the blinds.
There is a complication with the birth
explains a man in a white doctor’s coat.
She needs staples in her stomach
I nod silently.
She lurches at the staples
Blood sprays from her stomach
It fills her mouth.
I close my eyes,
blinking
itsyacreationstation 