It was that time when your Uncle Rob was living
\nwith your mother to help her out, do you remember?
\nWhen we arrived, the two of them were sitting
\nin their recliners like old marrieds, Rob, who always
\nliked dogs better than people, greeting not us,
\nbut Woody, with all his heart. You walked straight
\nahead with your tuna casserole to heat it up
\nin the kitchen while I followed carrying our bag
\nof gifts and the cake in my arms, past the new first-
\nfloor bathroom with the white toilet seat as high
\nas my cake box. Herman had been dead for years,
\nof course, but he was all around us in the dining room
\nby way of his colored photographs of the camp
\nand the White Mountains that seemed to shimmer
\nin the August light. I remember the smell of the hot
\nrolls on the table and your casserole, its cheese
\nbubbling up into the breadcrumbs. Beside you
\non her pillow wearing the napkin you tucked under
\nher chin, your mother looked a little like your child,
\nas in a sense she was. But when she told her story
\nabout her older sister on the farm, still washing
\nher son’s hair every week at age eighty-nine,
\nshe was as funny as she always was. On that day,
\nSue must have been – wasn’t she? – eighty-three
\nherself, yet when you set the cake in front of her,
\nshe blew out all eight candles and one to grown on
\nwith a single breath. No way she was going to waste
\nher time with some wish about her uncertain future,
\nshe called for the piece of cake she’d looked forward to
\nand dug right in. Meanwhile Rob, for his part, glanced
\neach way, then offered some of his cake to the dog
\nunder the table, both of them assuming that the little
\nblessings of ordinary life as we all know them
\nwould go on forever, no matter what. And they were right.\n
<<\/span> Telephone Poles<\/a><\/p> <\/div>\n<\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n Praise Song<\/a> ><\/span><\/p> <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n The Birthday Party It was that time when your Uncle Rob was living with your mother to help her out, do you remember? When we arrived, the two of them were sitting in their recliners like old marrieds, Rob, who always liked dogs better than people, greeting not us, but Woody, with all his heart. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6946,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"builder_content":"\n