Old Grandmother woman is planting trees.
Trees she will not see grow to their fullest height.
Carefully, she nestles the fragile bleached green seedlings into the soft brown earth.
“Be strong little ones” she whispers.
She remembers the trees that used to grow here.
Oak trees she climbed on as a child, and willow trees that shaded her on hot days.
She scans the horizon and in her mind she sees different buildings, different trees, long gone.
She carries an old time in her heart.
Her memories are many and flood her mind.
Like faded movies they play for her, sometimes unexpected.
The look of pure joy and wonder her husband gave her when she told him she was pregnant.
Rocking the babies to sleep, swaying back and forth, near the window, in the moonlight.
The dinners, the family, the rush of so many times of love, the laughing.
The deep joy of being with her grandchildren.
But also the darkness. Losing one of her babies, burying her parents, getting sick.
Somehow the whole thing is wrapped up in love but also loss.
