She is everywhere tonight.
In my hips as I sway, stirring broth made with bones and water and scraps of vegetables leftover over in the bin that were crushed under the weight of a newer, firmer model
Just the way she taught me.
With pinches of salt and bouquets of herbs and whispered prayers of thanks and desperation and hope.
Spinning stories of her Father, the stoic, Scottish fire chief
And her younger sister, the beautiful blonde
Her hair was auburn
It shone like fire
Like the end of her Salem menthols she left on the counter in perfect alignment with her red lighter.
Tapping her frosted, mauve nails on the kitchen table as she waited for the bubbles to slow to a simmer
As my sister and I would sneak Hydrox cookies and Lady Fingers in plain view from the cookie jar on the counter
beneath the flickering florescent light
Her letters to the missionaries in Papua New Guinea lined up neatly beneath her signed photograph of President Bush Sr.
Atop her leather-bound Bible, ear-marked and water-marked and the roledex of emergency numbers
Waiting for my grandfather to get home from the nightshift
For his bacon and eggs, two bowls of Honeycombs and a banana before he went to bed.
She is everywhere tonight.
In the song that I breathe-
Deep River.
The song that she played as a girl over and over again until the page was torn in two and she held it together with spit and cosmetic tape.
The pages are framed and hanging in my house above the piano she taught me my scales on.
Standing in the kitchen while I sat on the bench.
Calling out keys.
When my faulty fingers hit a wrong note she sang out-
"Again!"
And I knew that meant, from the very beginning. In order. Beginning at the C scale and working my way all the way back up.
I hated her for it then.
Now I sit down at the piano and weep onto the keys where her hands covered mine
As I play from her own books the songs she taught me-
The only ones I ever really knew how to play.
"I will play, you sing." She'd say.
She never asked me to do anything. She always commanded.
Go outside and play.
Drink your milk or you'll end up like me- popping her dentures out like a jack-in-the-box.
Finish your plate.
Sing. Always sing. When there is nothing left there will always be God and Music.
She was right.
She is everywhere tonight in my house.
Lingering over my garden, clicking her teeth at the way I've poorly cared for my hydrangeas.
Squishing my face against her rough cheek as though to pass love through two bodies.
Scolding me on the few pounds I've gained.
I went to visit her two weeks ago.
She used to stand tall.
Stout.
She was a rock in purple polyester and black slacks, always smelling of sweat and cooking onions and cheap perfume.
Now she is stooped and bound to a chair that does all of her walking for her.
It had been two months since I had seen her. It was too long but life gets busy and troublesome
So I brought hydrangeas to cheer her
and brought my daughter to bring her joy
And she didn't know who I was.
And now she is everywhere.
Who she is is outlined in my pours
I find her in my garden, in my kitchen, in my music, in my pen
So much of her in so much of me.
My fits of rage
My defiance
My courage
My anxiety
My determination.
They are her.
My need for outdoors
The way I feed my family
Care for my daughter
Love my neighbor
They are her.
She is everywhere tonight and I wish she could see how much of who I am
is because of what she gave to me.