GEORGE-L Archives

From: "Gene & Susan" <>
Subject: [GEORGE-L] Family Gathering
Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 08:18:02 -0500

Family Gathering

By Kaziah


I remember every Sunday dinner spent at Grandmother's house.
We, her legacy,
Kicking imaginary cans around in corners,
Muffling sounds of boredom upon threats of parents,
Sitting in the kitchen, envious of the grown up table.
The one in the dining room, the one meant for special occasions,
Always protected by a white table cloth.

That table was solid. It's oak leaves always in place,
Waiting for a ghost to stop in and tell us a story --
One that we may not have heard, or may have forgotten, or thought so silly.
Ghosts of family we never met, like my grandfather,
Supposedly the best story teller of them all.

I knew those absent faces by my grandmother's simple words.
Their eyes haunted through faded portraits and voices echoed between the
walls.
We were told how much we were so very like them -
Sister has the features of great-great Grandmother,
The boys look like their father, who looks like his,
Mother has her grandmother's sass.
Me, sometimes I'm my grandmother all over again.

The day has come when now the stories have changed, no more faded glimpses
into the past.
A very certain silence sits itself at the head of the table.
The stories that were once about 'them'
Will one day include memories of us, when we finally get to sit at the
grown-up table,
And try to fill the seats meant for others.

Sometimes, on a Sunday afternoon, I would try to hear grandfather speaking
through my grandmother's heart.
But now, silence screams throughout the house, no stories, no laughter, no
warmth.
I know that the ghosts listen for the next storyteller someone to lay the
white table cloth out
to set the table with Aunt Mary's china..

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• [GEORGE-L] Family Gathering by "Gene & Susan" <>