she gives us all her love

her voice, a garbled,
smoked etched sound.
even now, after being dead
for forty years,
you can hear
your grandmother's laugh,
her reprimands,
swearing at you
for not praying more,
for watching television
and gazing out the window,
wondering when
she would leave
and go back to boston.
you see her with her toast
and tea,
her number paintings,
the smell of oils
on her hands. you can
feel the stiff bite of
the fruitcake she made
and placed in a tin,
because she loved you,
loved all of you, as
God does,
and to eat none would
be a sin.