new things i've seen but don't know what to say

Genealogically

Family tree make sense.

Ghosts, you've got to slow down

before we can draw your filmy anatomy

into the pencil portraits

hanging from the necks

of other great ancestors.

My Father's Mother

Did you dance those 1930's blues

while Bonnie and Clyde ran the trail through thirty-two

making hot chocolate and paying dues

and they quit when you were six, before you knew

my father would arrive doubled in Delaware in February, 1952

with a twin who looked too much like him

and nothing like your father, or their father, or his father, and so on.

You tried to teach them French when they were ten combined

like you tried to teach me to knit, but my hands were too small

and the needles didn't fit,

but you had Johnny Cash

and The Sound of Music

in your record collection so we kicked our feet in time

to "Lonesome Me," and your ankles were slim

and the pantyhose still had the seam

up the back.