Lynn M. Knapp
Elizabeth
I did not expect to find her here,
faded, folded, held in darkness
in a dusty box,
my grandmother’s
grandmother.
I did not expect
to know her,
a woman
from muddy streets
of warring Missouri,
lifting blue sateen skirts,
tiptoeing
in laced kidskin boots,
skirting puddles,
pleat-edged bonnet and stray curls
lifting on the breeze.
I did not imagine
a glint in pale blue eyes,
quenched these many years,
could still hold me.