Grandma

To a dear, dear soul whose weaknesses I now see as strengths. Whom I will always miss, yet who I know is always, always with me.

Torrid secrets dancing
in the purple, dark
smudges beneath her violet eyes.

Dying to escape
her truths. Diabolical men,
serving disrespect on cowardly,
tarnished platters.

Damning demons masquerading
as a husband, brothers, self.
All throwing salt into
her invisible wound.

Dementia numbing
the edges of her jagged past.
Eyes remaining still hopeful,
a tenacious testament of
human endurance.

Resilient love thriving,
(past be damned!)
on the precipice of faith;
love warming like baked bread,
constant like oxygen. Like the sun.

A white flag offered, illuminated
by faith, dutifully woven with forgiveness
and imagined insurance
for her legacies.

Relief spilling
out of violet reserves,
she blissfully resided
in the few, dusty, happy
corners of her dwindling mind.