Friday Night Poetry Corner #41; To Grandmother

This is late Friday Night Poetry Corner #41, but it is a special one. On August 30, 2014 my grandma; Alma Higgins had her 100th birthday.

Sweet, long hard centennial.

I can’t image the things she seen. The moments in time she was a witness to. The evolution and devolution of human kind. The struggles, plight of African-Americans along with all Americans. The vicious wars along with the evils of Jim Crow. The manic economic, rational and spiritual depressions. The numerous presidents that didn’t resemble her until 2008.

The understanding and respect all ethic groups began have for one another, well more so from her time.

Her unique grasp on survival and exultation. Her gentle reasoning of loss and forgiveness. Joy and riches, poor and self-doubt. Strength in knowing when, how to push on. The courage in knowing when to let go. She observe so many love ones who passed during her life. So many people lost in time but alive within her. The beautiful smile she displays when saying “Hey y’all.” The various speeches of people who she heard that could move crowds as well as shun the good away. One way or another she made it through and still had the foundation to say, “Hey y’all.”

There is so much more to my grandma, her wisdom of human interaction is magnificent. How she recognizes the most in all and ways to makes us gain from it. The country living and the old roads of Louisiana made me so humble and so honored to have such a beginning.

The future doesn’t seem so scary as her road map gave me, us much faith in human resilience. A road with a 100 ways of knowing the right direction…

TO GRANDMOTHER
By MIKE SANTIAGO.

A Grandmothers love is hard
To explain

It is made up of joy sacrifice
And pain

A Grandmothers love is patient
And forgiving

And each moment with her
Makes life worth living

A Grandmothers love turns a
House into a home

And her beauty shines like a
Precious stone

A Grandmothers love will
Always touch your soul

A love so gentle Gods gift
To behold