For Grandmother
Emily Dickinson wrote:
“Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me.”
Grandmother stopped baking pecan pies years ago.
She stopped roasting the turkeys and making two dressings-
one with sage, one without.
She stopped swimming in the neighborhood pool-
always keeping her hair dry as she did the sidestroke.
She stopped playing bridge with her friends, Scrabble with her daughter and sisters
and tiddly winks with her grandkids.
She stopped driving to the grocery store or to get her hair done
and she stopped traveling very far to visit friends and family.
She stopped remembering the little things and the new things and the unimportant things.
But until the end, she was Grandmother.
She never stopped sewing with felt and sequins and a rainbow of thread
and she eventually went off pattern and created for herself.
She told her favorite old stories time and again from the comfort of the warmest home that we’ll over know.
She hugged her family with the brightest and youngest of smiles
and she sang her childhood songs with her husband and children nearby.
She counted Christmas cards as they were delivered
and she watched us in the frames that surrounded her.
She joined us to celebrate birthdays and holidays and regular Sundays and she signed her name with joy to every birthday card.
And she remembered all the big things and all the old things and all the important things.
And finally in her own bed,
Surrounded and visited and prayed for by the family she created and imbued with grace and light,
And after 94 years of love and happiness and peace and life,
Grandmother defied Emily Dickinson
and kindly stopped for Death.
We will miss her always but she is in everything we do and in everything we are
and we honor her by living the good, simple, warm and happy lives that she inspires.
-Amy Mathis Burns
October 29, 2012 written
October 30, 2012 read
