And after forty years her flowers failed to sing.
Geraniums blanched. Her blue begonias lost
their battle to the dulling rain. The neighborhood
was dead and gone. Only lines of kindness
in her face remained and her remarkable
arbor, my thoughts of wine. I stood clumsy
on her porch and worried if she wondered
why I’d come. When I walked in her door
I knew more secrets than ever about time.
It turned out I remembered most things wrong.
Miss Holy Roller never had
an illegitimate son. The military father
had been good to animals and the Gunthers
were indifferent to Hitler when we stoned
their house. I remembered some things right.
A dog was scalded by hot paraffin.
Two children died and a strange man really lived
alone a block away, shades always drawn,
and when we sang our mocking song about
the unseen man, we really heard him beating walls.
The rest was detail I had missed. Her husband’s
agonizing prolonged death. Her plan to live
her last years in another city south.
It was lucky you came, she said. Four days
and I’ll be gone. Outside, on the road
the city’d never paved, gravel cracked like popcorn
and everywhere the dandelions adult years
had taught me to ignore told me what I knew
when I was ten. Their greens are excellent
in salad. Their yellow flowers
make good wine and play off like a tune
against salal I love remembering to hum.