My Sister and I
Wait for the Sun
(Kelleys Island)

A poem by
Mary Grimm

In the cold light before the sun my sister and I play
at wakefulness in vacationland. We watch the dark
sink away under the light which is always coming,

not yet here, the rising that does not rise, the sun hiding
its light under the bushel of the world. This bird
hopping at our feet, the sharp rocks, the white flower,

the bending branch of the maple tree—when will they
be more the color of themselves? Getting up to see
the sun rise: we may be too old for this, we may later

have to take a nap. Our grandmother got up in the dark
to make coffee for the boarders, and oatmeal, to slice
bread thickly, crumbs scattering before her knife. Did she

watch the sun while the coffee boiled in its pot? Her hands
on her back, which ached, her hair already in its hard little
knot, the sun a red blister, her hands fanned out to thin

the pain: we do not know how she felt. If she were sitting
beside us, her black laced shoes stalwart on the rocks,
her flowered dress disposed over her knees, stockings

knotted at the calf, would she speak? Her one gold earring
gleamed as if it could tell a tale of the dark European forest,
of the maid who became a matron, who left the making

of someone else’s beds, the stirring of someone else’s
soup, to make ours smooth, stir ours until the dumplings
whirled and jigged. Why sleep, her earring says, when there

is work to be done? Why sit on rocks looking for the beet
slice of the sun? Her arms itch to sweep, her hands
to knead, her feet to tread the path of her days. Overhead

it leaves a wake of air that warms and stirs the earth.
Grandma taps her foot sharply, the click of her hard sole
shaming our Nikes. Her gold earring winks and glows

as if it is something that could rise, her hair silver
as the threads of cloud stretching across the sky. Who is
sleeping? Who will wake to the dawn of the world?

Copyright 2006 by Mary Grimm