When I was four, I knew the ring was mine.

Grandmama never promised me. but i knew.

Marquise cut ruby and diamonds shone

and glittered on her hand, a blood red hue.

That night as she slept, I sneaked in her room.

The blood red eye winked in the moonlit loft

beckoning, draw closer, in the soft beam.

Grandmama turned, smell of gardenias waft.

I was thirteen when she died at ninety.

I could not feel too sad; she was old.

Grandmama lay there, her face all wrinkly.

Life was gone. The ring on her hand I hold

does not slide into mine. Softly I cry

at my failure and Mother calls to me.

False tears fall. Again, much later, I try.

Swiss Army knives are so very handy.

Sometimes late, late at night

when the clocks do chime,

gardenias fill the room.

And I hear, "The ring is mine!"