Judith Minty
Mad Painter Poems

Growing up, I lived on a street named Northlawn.
My bedroom was upstairs, but the guest room,
where my grandmother stayed, was on the first
floor. I could tell when she'd arrived for a visit
because the house smelled of Raleigh cigarettes.
One day, a few months after my grandmother died of a heart attack,
my mother came home with a new silk dress.
It was pale green, a Chinese print, and made her look like a movie star.
I stood at the guest room door while she tried it on.
"It's tight, here, across the modice," my mother said to no one.
For a moment, I saw my grandmother standing behind her,
the red pincushion a bracelet on her wrist.

ISBN 1-882983-25-4
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