The Portable Grandmother
I carry her around my bone
I see her
wooden spoon in hand
mixing flour
into generations of bread
humming a song from old Russia
into the soup
You can’t make something from nothing, she said
She built a home from chicken bones
bits of onion, carrot
words, stories, years
like wind across the Steppe
I hear her knitting
tick and tick
punctuate my waking
ravel up the day
and tickle me to sleep
She gives me apples with honey
a place to be from
a people to belong to
She makes the shifting world
solid
Her calm voice
pushes back the night
endures all
demands fealty
Her gray ghost
weighty as platinum
I carry her around my bone
Lorrie Wolfe
Published in *Mountains, Myths & Memories*
