Tethered

The grand-babies appeared among us, delivered on the doorstep,
wrinkled like little rutabagas.
They were new, untouched, plucked fresh from the garden, or wherever they come from, babies. No one knows.

They showed up just as I was thinking about my own departure,
Not that I’m ready to leave, but let’s face it, the earth, sometime soon, will call me home.

That’s how it is. Someone always arriving, someone always heading off.

Seven decades, moving towards eight, I am.
Getting a bit crusty around the edges, like stale bread, that’s what old folks are.
But the babies are wet and soft, like the flesh of summer plums.
They drip and drool and taste delicious.

I hold them tight, gumming them with kisses,
rocking them with cradle songs from the old country,
the ones my Nonna sang to me.

And I can feel time
like a feather, tickling my heart.

 

 

About the Poet:
Gabriella Brand’s poems, short stories and essays have appeared in Room Magazine, Cordite, The Blue Line, The Poeming Pigeon, The Christian Science Monitor and several anthologies. One of her poems was included in the latest anthology published by the celebrated Washington D.C. bookstore, Poetry and Prose. She was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2014.

Gabriella divides her time between Connecticut, where she teaches foreign languages, the Caribbean, where she volunteers, and the Eastern Townships of Quebec, where she hikes, and canoes.   Website:   gabriellabrand.net

 

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