MY FATHER’S MOTHER DIED OF BLOOD

My father’s mother died of blood,
The lack of it; or did she waste
Away, a cancered form of food
& medicine? The night she died,
My father & I stood outside
Her planet, silent as he faced

Funeral north, the winter flight
To Boston & the freeze beyond.
His displaced arms hugged light,
Then himself, then me. “You’re
All I have, you mother & your
Sisters.” Trees flapped. We found

Each other. I had not yet seen
My father cry, for almost everyone
Else had died before I’d been
Born. Grandfathers had no face,
Nor heavy breath, had neither place
Nor time; for me, were always gone.

But this man who I was in part
Was more than arms & breath,
Had seen buried secrets, his heart
Knotted & unknotted, his hair
Slightly grayed. He stood there
A great while, thinking of death,

Flight, families, about him & me,
& long lives wrinkled like the sea.