Grandpa
by P.H. Wise

Walking up the dusty trail through wild grass
Up, up, up the hill,
Covered in stickers and itching where the grass brushed against me
I arrived to see him smiling, and Grandma too
And we’d talk,
endless conversations over wood chopping;
The wood pile always needed filling
We used to shoot the breeze together
Though we never did manage to hit it

It’s a funny thing, trying to find the words
To show what a person meant to you
To show the value of a man’s life
But no words will ever really substitute
For an afternoon with the two of them,
Playing chess once the work was done,
And afterwards,
I’d cook dinner with Grandma,
And the three of us would eat together.

And then to see him fade
To see his sharpness dull
To see his wits wind down
Like a runner who’s finished his long race -
I was going to go see him tomorrow,
On the day he died
And though I never had the chance to tell him so that day,
I wanted to say,
“I love you, Grandpa,

and when memory fades like the morning mist
and confusion seeps into everything
and old friends and children are no longer known
When you feel the shedding of memory,
layer by layer
like a snake shedding its skin
When the world grows dark around you,
And hope is faded and dim,
When in the winter of your life,
the spring to come seems worlds away
Keep holding on
Holding on
Home is not far off.”