The Woman My Grandmother Loved.

Chapter Twenty-seven

Happy married life, my love. When you complete your seven generations with him; I will be waiting at the altar for the eighth and the millions remaining. Until then, I will contend myself with the childish fact that just occurred to me. The number eight is shaped like infinity, isn't it?

Yours,

Becky.

Some of the snippets of Anita's poems for Becky.

1972, January 3rd.

I have laughed at writers who have been seduced,
By the temporariness of beauty and things as such.
But come this season and I didn't laugh,
For even the cornflowers smiled prettily,
Weeds blessed by Venus,
When they sat upon your hair.
I think I understood;
Why Literature has spoken so much of;
Women blushing under cherry pink evening skies.

August 1974

I dreamt of a summer sky,
One-sixtieth of every prophecy is a dream,
The ancient Lords had said.
A clear blue sky and dandelions nodding,
A sleepy premonition; if I were to call it that.
A lazy bubble- the pretense of calm
They say it comes right before the storm?
But is that all it takes,
Sixty, like the minutes of my clock?
Clairvoyance, an art, you make me wish I could master.
I would slip into your sleep and whisper;
Fragrant thoughts for two whole months,
Until you would walk into my slumber,
Lift the veil between dream and reality,
And look me in the eye and say,
Will you be my prophecy?

April, 1974

Let it woven in the fabric of time,
Words that fail me now.
Let it be remembered that I have loved
And know what it is like to be loved.
When I grow old and my limbs heavy,
When the pain of her absence starts to fade,
I hope Time will remind me why I fell in love.
I have fallen for the red of her hair,
The hellfire in her eyes,
The storms in her brain
And the demons she can unleash.
When I forget all of this, I hope Time reminds me,
That I had once loved a woman who held
Within her the entire universe of chaos
And that she had loved me too.

The day Becky cried, 1969

I would walk into a hundred mirrors if I had to,
If that was what it took.
I'd erase all the hate you see yourself with
And paint it with what I see you as.
I would draw the red of your hair against the canvas
And show you how it made me smile on Sundays.
The dimples in your knees,
I would show you how I long to kiss them.
The sway of your hips,
The sun-kissed freckles on your cheeks.
I would show you how,
You needn't hide them away with paint.
And in the backdrop of my endless love,
I would show you a hundred ways in which I think you are perfect.
And a thousand and one reasons why,
I wouldn't change a thing.

April, 1977
I have seen shades of lipstick,
Painted across lips that vary,
Seductive pouts and lurid grimaces,
Dazzling smiles paired with conniving eyes.
But last week after you left,
I turned to the mirror for  company and found;
The cherry-red coating your words,
Inked across my neck.
I hadn't learned before,
But lipsticks are not meant to just adorn.
They're built to stain,
Set reminders in the skin,
In rogue hues that threaten.
Don't you dare forget; they whisper.
Raw caresses and angry desires.
For them I'll pick one of my colors;
Will you tell me, darling?
If your skin speaks of me in mauve whispers?

September, 1979

Don't you see it, Father?
Gilded cages can never suffice
Now that I've flown on the wings of the wind.
You disagree now; but how could you forget?
Princesses are born to be queens.
Father, I have to tell you;
I cannot bear to lie.
I think I've found mine;
Who said a nation cannot have two queens?