Amma

I can whip out the accent

at the drop of a hat.

 

The sweet, syrupy voice stuck with me,

and its slow drawl,

as it demanded goodness while she

told me I was beautiful.

 

She always said that.

I could look like I crawled

out from under a dumpster in the worst 

of New York's five buroughs and

she meant it when she said I'm gorgeous.

 

As I left, she'd grab my right hand 

with her left and shake it--

patting it, staring into my eyes,

saying, "my beautiful girl"

without fail and with so much love.

 

She was sugar, lemons, and iced tea:

the Southern stereotypes and manners personified,

ugly parts included but she was so good.

 

She had a rich woman's attitude and 

just enough money to hang on.

Her daughter won the scratch-off lotto

just after Amma immigrated to Illinois but her Southern

hosipitality grew and the parties

 

She was soft, yellow sunshine

poured out on all of us.

 

Picture a garden, stuffed with 

those huge pink flowers that almost look ripped

and ripe orange trees with less green than orange and

blossoms, and minty leaves 

and a white trellis covered in climbing vines

that's my Amma.

 

When I was little, and we visited

the guardhouse where she lived,

next to mansion, she had hair so long

it floated down near her knees, pure white,

and she gave it one hundred strokes exactly

every night, a long braid,

wrapped and pinned in a classy bun

every day.

 

Like me, the woman was always cold.

Snow covered winters were torture for her,

and that was when she talked most of "down home." 

 

We went back there at the dawn of summer

with her ashes in a box. 

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