Growing Up The Hard Way

� Elizabeth Larrabee

Papa took me to Boston once.

We went by train.

That's all I can recall of it.

But it was about then,

yes, I was nine or ten,

when Grandpa Larrabee

died in our tenement.

I kissed him as he lay

on his death bed that day.

Home for lunch,

I had gone in to say

"I got A in spelling this morning,

Grandpa".

Stretched out beside his emaciated body,

my scrawny arm

thrown across his chest,

his mustache bristled against my cheek.

Then, my eyes closed tight against

the soft beat of his heart ?

"Are you hungry, Grandpa?"

He squeezed my hand

without opening his eyes.

And was not there

when I ran home after school.

I grieved and I grew.

So will my grandchildren.

� Elizabeth Larrabee

Earliest Recall | Lady Slippers | How Poor Were We? | Free Food

The Smaller The Bigger | Mud Flats | Speaking of Smells | Random Pieces

Growing Up the Hard Way �| No Bogey Man | Green Apples | Poor Buster

Up and Down | True Friends | Moving | Rosie's Hangout | Crystal Ball

You weren't so Hot After All | Haunts | On Acting the Way You Feel | Amen

� ��� �

E-Mail Liz Larrabee