At My Grandmother's Headstone

At My Grandmother’s Headstone


It is fall, but the leaves are still
Green. I can feel their death
Coming with the draft; I pull my coat tight.
Today the wind is the reaper.

My son, on the blanket that was mine,
Is grinning. He does not feel cold.
He feels the sun on his cheek, reaches hands
Upwards to the blaze in the sky,

I wonder how someone so tiny
Could be warm. I remember,
He is new. In time, he will know the cold.
He is the rose in the graveyard.

I lean over him, my shadow covers
His face. I see my reflection
In his eyes, he knows me. I am the sun.
I am the fire that will warm him.