Grandmother's House

Grandmother's House did not smell of chicken.
Her house only travels in memory.
It has run away from me,
the prodigal grandson.

Most Sundays after church
we would go to Queen Anne's buffeteria
and I would eat fried chicken.
I always had the drumstick
and mashed potatoes.
Small white hills topped with dark lakes.


Grandmother's House was not by any rivers,
nor at the edge of any woods.
It was made of brick and mortar.
It was three blocks from the ice cream parlor
where Grandfather and I would walk
most afternoons for single-dip vanilla
after playing Chinese Checkers.

The pock-marked star
was a mystical design.
We fell into it, young & old bound together
in silent contemplation.

This was mother's house too, house of her youth.
She was little girl lost amid
train tracks and china cups.

Did the little girl walk hand in hand
to the ice cream shop with her father?
Did the little girl
hide under afternoon tea tables?
Did the little girl sew fabric scraps
at the edge of the quilting bee?

I loan the little girl my memories
because she never shared her memories.
She never told me how it was that day -

just like that, her hair flamed into snakes,
Little girl lost saw them rising from her shadow,
and she was frightened.
In her confusion and grief,
she tried to eat her children.

I’m actually thinking of three houses:

The house where the lost little girl lived,
     which was protected by the mystic star;
Much later, it was the Gorgon's house,
     illumined by the dial of a rail road watch
     then magnified to ashes;
And then, the house reborn and rebuilt.
It runs from my memory.

Grandmother’s House runs east
on slender chicken legs.

Grandfather's railroad watch
held its own council in a bell jar
on the faux fireplace mantle.
It stood guard during my six month captivity,
when I was the Gorgon's captive.

I was lucky.
The boy next door, my long time playmate,
could not leave his fenced front yard.
Somehow we played Gunsmoke
through the fence.


The only way Grandmother could get me
to come in was to say
the Three Stooges were on.

The TV was on the west wall.
The faux fireplace was on the north wall.
There was a closet just off the living room,
on the east wall,
where all the toys were stored.
Where the little girl’s Shirley Temple tea set
was still stored,
along with the mystic Chinese checkers
and the dominoes
and other mysteries.

The next room east was the bedroom
where they kept the crib.
I studied the grey metal bars
and perceived the spirits
that watched over the house.
Now I grasp at those spirits.

Those spirits that ride Grandmother’s House
as it races the eastern wind.

The Gorgon who was once a lost little girl
did not like the dark mirror in her heart.

Grandmother’s glasses were a shield.
Grandmother’s smile was the helmet of honor.

The Gorgon once told me
that a dark prince had stolen the guardian watch
and burned down Grandmother’s House.
But the house still stands today.

Little girl was lost in the labyrinth she built
seeking her father’s love. She lost truth’s thread
as she was chasing her mother’s affection.
She lost her honor as her mirror grew darker.

I was wrong.
Grandmother’s House is not running from me.
It’s leading me to the next
mystic star, the next
magic mirror, the next
Golden Rectangle Doorway.