Lawn Chairs

Lawn chairs for me are the vehicles of time travel:

Plastic webbing, aluminum tubing, Space-Age curves

The sound of crickets, the smell of pine, a setting sun

And I am there in my grandmother’s backyard

Happy.

The pine trees came from Vermont years ago and she

Planted them in the southeast corner to create privacy

Because the neighbors were otherwise very close.

When I looked up, I saw Vermont and pine cones and imagined snow

And quiet and winter and another time completely

Before I was born and therefore could not feel alone

And inadequate and so much less than what they wanted.

Two trees and their distant pine cones became my forest.

By day my grandmother and I sat under those trees in summer

To feel cool and faraway, and she lit incense

She was sure would smell like pot to the neighbors.

It was a small back yard, but it was old and the grass was thick

That knew the bare feet of generations of my family.

Give me a lawn chair, and I will tell you about a grandmother

Who knew her stories were worth telling because

They belonged to both of us and said love because

So many before us found that life was worth living.  

Her summer daisy chain

Of sitting under trees and feeling the cool was the gift of time

And of all who loved us but were gone.