For her heart was pounding such

I thought it would leap from her chest

and fall flat onto the cold floor

to slide there to quivering extinction.

Her soul was shriveling such

that it twined and twisted upon a single thread-

its catchment snapping for the plunge into the river Styx.

She lay down in her cool night,

misted with early dew in her eyes

she grieved cold, cold upon cold;

her body shivering.

Vulture claws and talons reached

her Spiritual Keep

and sank their meanness deep

wounding the marrow

of where she lived-

all her treasures now exposed

and her Will raw-tested near impoverishment.

Grandmother cried.

Yet I saw her over time repose

and recompose and thrust away

these encumberments;

the dreadful sight of a dead child-our mother,

birthed, she said from 72 hours labor-

and followed thereafter in days a husband dead

in cancer's clutch-

she sat alone, comfortless

as we children drew near in our bewilderment-

this sense of total demolishment shrouding all.

Our eyes drew near; we could see

she had began to shunt aside fear

transforming herself

from the Pity-Pyre to new resolve to live again

for the sake and betterment of us-the children.

Clear as the book and the page we  read

Grandmother began repairing heart and sinew,

face and spirit and like the phoenix bird

rose before us-new mission ensconced upon her clear.

Steel Purpose all in her she said:

'I shall be here children, no need to be afraid.'

This is what Grandmothers are for.'