Myrtine Petersen Grove July 16, 1891 - April 10, 1966

 

Myrtine 

I was not my grandmother’s favorite grandchild, but I adored both my grandparents. I was devastated when we lost my dear Grandma on April 10, Easter Sunday, 1966. 

I was a Junior in high school and heavily into the music of the day. I’d grown my hair long, cut bangs, grown them out again, and mimicked Joan Baez, Janis Ian and Judy Collins with my guitar. John Lennon, Bob Dylan and Hoyt Axton were my heroes, and I wasn’t the ingenue that my cousin Marci was. My grandmother often told me I should try to be more like her. I loved my grandmother too much to resent those comments and had no intention of ever being anyone but who I was.

Myrtine Petersen Grove, born July 16, 1891 in Colman, Moody, South Dakota, died on April 10, 1966 in Enumclaw, Washington, at home, sitting in a chair, eating her daughter’s canned peaches, put up in August of 1965, when it never occurred to anyone that Grandma wouldn’t be with us the next summer, pressing the lids on fruits and vegetables to test the seal, making sure there was fresh coffee perking, and cheese sandwiches drowning her dark Danish bread, while we all labored away in the hot kitchen, juggling jars, rings, lids and boiling water.

Married

My Beautiful Grandparents

My grandma’s bread was the best in the world, brown, with a hint of sweetness, rich, like her constant coffee, little slices that were often overwhelmed by layers of cheese, thinly sliced ham or beef, beet pickles and tart mustard. Her klejner and æbleskiver were not just holiday delicacies; they were warm in her kitchen on a regular basis, rolled in powdered or granulated sugar, greeting you at the back door, assuring your special place in her kitchen, which always smelled like a cross between a bakery and laundry, where the scent of her steam iron mixed with all the smells of a loving, well-tended home.

                                                 My precious grandmother and me

My Danish grandmother eschewed pants and wore delicate patterned and floral dresses of cotton, silk crepe and chiffon, even for daily wear. The scent of lilacs and lavender will always remind me of resting my cheek against her soft bosom, even as I grew into adolescence.

Grandpa Carl and Me and Grandma Myrt

Grandma, my mom, a Danish exchange student, Grandpa, Me

1964

Even though I was the little hippie girl, and my grandmother would often tell me to get my hair out of my eyes, she was one of my biggest fans when it came to my singing and reading out loud. I don’t know who loved it more, she or I, when I’d sit cross-legged on the floor and entertain her, while she crocheted her lacy patterns, the needle weaving in and out, her fingers moving with practiced precise movements that she’d perfected over several decades.

The night before Grandma passed, our family was at my grandparents, my mother making dinner, urging her mother to relax and get well, after a mini-stroke had hospitalized her the week before. I was in my usual spot in the living room in front of my grandmother, reading to her from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass. My mother popped her head into the room to tell us dinner was soon ready, and Grandma told her to get the bust of Hans Christian Andersen down from the mantel. She wanted my mother to write my name on the bottom, to make sure I got it when she died. There was medical tape on the side table from when the doctor had been there earlier, taking a sample of my grandmother’s blood. My mother wrote Margo from Grandma Grove 4/9/66, and then went back to finish getting dinner on the table for my dad, grandparents, little brother and me. I suppose we protested a little, as people commonly do when someone wants to bequeath a treasure, but she’d promised it to me long before that night, so we didn’t go on about it, to my recollection.

The next morning, when my mother was in church playing the organ for the early Easter service, her mother went to be with her angels who’d gone on ahead of her. I'm sure they greeted her blowing trumpets, strumming harps and singing Broadway tunes like You Gotta Have Heart, from Them Damn Yankees, a musical my grandpa had taken Myrtine to see on one of their trips to New York. I suppose if that's where they are, I'll get to see her again one day. If that's where I'll go. 

Thanks for reading...

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POPO 2021

Can you believe it's been a year since I blogged here? I told someone the other day "2020 is just a big bird dropping splotch on our calendars. Nothing happened, or so it seems." Now we've rolled around to another Postcard Poetry and I shamelessly will promise to get better again about blogging and hope to have some good news before this year in over.

In the meantime, here is PoPo 2021:

                                    The Great Wall of China in Six Parts

Can you see me up there at the top of the hill? 

All you need to do is enter, step...step by step. 

Up, up, follow what path has been given you, 

a map, unnecessary when it's all laid out for you. 

A window, 

essential to seeing in, 

and seeing out. 

Vast, 

with so much promise, 

all that is required is to 

open 

eyes 

wide 

shut.

The Chinese wall,

intended as protection,

was a path for 

travelers...and so one could move, 

stand still, 

balk, 

reach, 

reject, 

run to or from, 

fear, 

admire, 

care for, 

or seek to destroy.

And I stand and wait, 

watching moons and suns ascend, descend, 

stars come out and diminish, 

comets vanish, 

planets born, die, change names, 

and a plan for your return 

in the distance, 

where I can make out 

the thin form of your resistance. 

Where it begins, ends, 

falls in disrepair, 

seems invisible 

from the blind eye, 

rolls, 

like the blood in your veins, 

connected, 

never completed severed, 

always pulsing, 

always present, 

always struggling. 

Spring arrives each year with hope, 

a new possibility with 

a non-holiday holiday. Cruises

into summer, on the edge, 

the opportunity to reject once again, 

just like autumn does; and winter disappoints, 

over and 

over again. 

Family Legends

The stuff for family legends isn't always worth repeating even though details may be clear and unforgotten. When my son was lost at sea and there were helicopters searching dark waters, his father trying to figure out how he would explain to me he'd lost our boy, who was sound asleep in a deep bunk midship. Rescue teams cheered while we fumbled with untrusted emotions. 

However I'm Dressed

I know you think this is an invitation. 

It's not. 

It's me, 

being me. 

On the beach, 

the pool, 

walking down the street, 

over the bridge, 

in school, 

at work, 

in the grocery line, 

at the theater, 

wherever you see me, 

however I'm dressed, 

no matter how much skin 

I choose to show, 

or hide... 

this 

is 

not 

an 

invitation.

                                      LOSING YOU

                                   

Losing you was losing a part of my history. 

There were things that only you and I 

could remember and now 

I must remember them on my own. 

With no one to validate the memories. 

And the sadness is not so much 

that you are gone, 

 it's that we are gone.

aLmOSt NoRmaL

We almost started

being a little normal.

Trader Joe's even took down                               

their plastic shields. 

Masks were optional 

for the vaxxed.                                                        

Too soon.                                                                            

Wildfires make the skies hazy.

Again.

This.

This is our new normal.

Masks fulfill multiple purposes. 

We are all frogs 

in a warming pot.

The canary has sung.

Chinooks

Lavish Saturday morning 

breakfasts at Chinooks. 

Laughing family laughs, eating 

honeyed butter, and the tingly taste 

of orange zest. Seagulls 

piercing the calm of the drizzle 

hanging under the sky, scolding 

us for living too well, telling us to 

go home, 

pack for the future. 

Forgiving Myself

Flipping through old notebooks, photos, clippings, poems, quotes, flattened matchbooks. Hours pass as the sun floats across the southern sky on a warm summer afternoon and I, caught indoors, forget the garden, the dust and dishes and all other duties, forgiving myself for places I meant to see, words left unspoken, dried up tears, ships that have sailed. 

Life Redirected

Once I had submitted to the life 

that had been redirected for me, 

I dove in headlong. Limbs

no longer were a matter for

prom gowns and 

summers at the lake, 

ski slopes or wooden stages. 

I became a leg to cling to, 

a vessel of milk, rich and blue,

arms never empty, 

a backbone 

stronger than my mother 

ever predicted. 

New shoes, 

a different hat. 

The Summer of '66

The summer of '66, 

I thought I had 

everything figure out. But 

I missed some things. 

How to protect myself. 

How to fight back. 

How to say "no." 

My outlook 

was always cheery and 

I was confident. There were 

leading roles in my future, 

straight A's, 

the Dean's list. There were 

other lists, too, which 

I could not have foreseen. 

I have no regrets but 

I have some good advice.

Makah 1993 Neah Bay 

Our heads were filled with magic 

and a new ancient language. 

We walked on whaling beaches 

where history has been forgotten 

by those who choose to change it. 

The songs, 

the food, 

the stories, 

the mystical words, 

clicking and soothing, 

the craggy beautiful faces, 

the clamshell yearning 

for a different time and place

Master Thief 

I'll teach you how to steal he said. 

First you take the little things

They go unnoticed. The big things

are harder; you're always being watched.

But it's not impossible. You must be

brave and put on a face, as if

you don't care at all. Pretend

it belongs to you. The 

difficult part is when 

they steal from you. Some 

have nothing of 

value. He taught me how to steal. 

He was a Master Thief.

New York September 2019 

East Village

was a perfect time 

in the city garden 

with Marta, who had

the key to let us in to the

fairy lights and 

marjoram, parsley, 

Simon and Garfunkel warbling

over speakers meant for

dayworkers. It was a 

sister kind of night,

young and brash,

old and wrinkled,

in between,

imparting stories, opinions, guidance,

raucous laughter, tittering giggles,

bold invitations, glasses never

half empty, pushing the morrow

out of our minds.

CATS

My son wrote a little

personal essay once about our cats; past,

present, and future. He was 9 at the time 

and it was 

one of the sweetest things 

I've ever read by anyone. He

laboriously typed it out on my "Selectric" 

and I still believe I will find that yellowed

piece of parchment paper in a box

someday. I miss all those cats.

Brave

Looking back, I can see 

the crack forming when Brave 

died. A strong beautiful hen, 

so named because 

Brave 

was who she was. One of the

original brood, she 

carried so much weight 

on her tiny feathered wings;

so many expectations,

future dreams,

silent songs,

little secrets,

prospects for a formidable foundation.

Hope.

Peanut Butter Memories

My bro and I shared a love 

of certain edible things. 

Popcorn, 

tacos... and peanut butter 

on warm toast with butter melted 

and dripping! You bite into it 

and it oozes between 

your teeth, gets stuck 

to your cheek hollows and 

you wash it down with a cup of 

good strong coffee. All 

those things 

make me remember him; 

olfactory memories.

Kornfeld

He was just a guy 

who lived in my building. I 

collected his rent 

every month. He smoked 

so I saw him outside 

usually. I 

talked with him 

and his son about 

football, croquet, 

dogs, the weather. He 

died alone in a hospital 

room while others 

were attended to. No 

one was saved. I 

was the only person 

he said goodbye to. 

    Childish Summer

    Mornings were soft and fresh... 

    smell of dust from 

    the alley, green wet 

    grass. Trees, with gnarly 

    roots, to create spaces under, 

    outdoor sanctuaries with 

    rock-lined borders, little imaginary 

    shops where fairies visited 

    after dusk, when children 

    were meant to be 

    indoors. 

    Dolls dragged out of 

    bedrooms, then found 

    in the morning dew, forgotten, 

    then retrieved and 

    loved again. Kool-aid 

    with so much sugar

    it hurt your teeth, soda 

    crackers, peanut 

    butter, fresh picked 

    berries, slightly 

    dusty. Barefoot 

    for weeks on end; 

    toes splayed in September. 

  

Battle Lines

Battle lines

were drawn.

One of us fought hard, 

the other with a short stick, 

keeping monsters 

at bay. It ended 

in an emotional rout and 

open wounds closed 

eventually but 

the salt remained. 

Ships sailed. 

Horizons fell dark 

but never stayed that way. 

New shores harkened. 

Castles were built 

on sand.

California

Songs have been written about California, 

the beaches, the palm trees, the sunset pigs, the hotels. 

It pulled me until I got fed up with partial truths, earthquakes, 

and broken promises. 

I won't forget the swarm of baby hummingbirds, 

Olvera Street, mean geese in Sacramento, canyon bike rides, 

being taken for rock stars, Paul Bunyan, the pier, 

candles in wine bottles, and your hair.

Fall 1968

I loved the market, 

even the odors of raw fish, mixed 

with the pungent smells of mums 

and marigolds. It wasn't a tourist 

attraction yet, just a place to buy 

from vendors, the deli, and a newsstand 

with hundreds of selections; 

I could've hung out there all day. I 

bought pudding from 

the sweet Asian lady, 

a peach, 

and a tomato, 

which I ate whole, 

sprinkled with salt. 

You told me I was pregnant. 

We Saw the World

From the time I was 6 or 7, my bicycle was total freedom. No one really cared much where I was in our safe, small town. I was GONE, down the street, around the corner and into the wild. When he was 2 and I was 11, my baby brother joined me, perched in the basket on my handlebars. We saw the world. Our world. We had no borders and wide horizons. 

Another Country

 I loved you in another country

There were maps leading us down roads, over seas,

into mountains and jungle, that we imagined

or simply conjured. So we could

go our own way, like birds

in a murmuration, whirling,

changing with a whim, impossible 

to follow.

Off the charts.

CHURCH

Anklets, bare legs all the way up to the Sunday panties, Mary Janes

that pulled socks down over the heel, like a tiny determined conveyor belt, 

repeatedly. Impossible to find two socks that matched, per order of Mom.

Late. Snow splattered on the landscape like crispy sugar. Holding a heavy green

hymnal with crackling pages, wishing to be home

having hotcakes with Dad.

The Eye

I miss you, Dad. You always had an eye on us, 

even when we were far far away.

You were all seeing and you knew

everything.

At least we thought you did and

that was good enough for us.

OUR HOUSE

Our house was a very very very fine house, 

on the best street, 

on the best hill,

in the best city,

in the best state,

in the best country, 

on the best planet. 

We used to sing this song 

when we thought nothing could change, 

fooled 

by our image of reality. 

We were so wrong. 

 

Distant Smoke

In the distant smoke of the future, I will not acknowledge

pain or sorrow. I will see my beauties as full-grown

human sculptures, perfect in every way,

better even,

having gained wisdom 

through ears and eyes. May they 

always think of me,

who loved them completely,

as one who cradles them through 

distant smoke.

And now another year of PoPo has been completed. I ask the post office to hand-cancel my little poems as they are sent abroad and near, in hopes words will be left clear and legible, but there is always some overzealous postal worker, who needs to run these tiny pictures through mean machines. One hopes they arrive somewhat intact and if not, here are all the words, and the images, too. Cards are collected at estate sales mostly and these poems are rough drafts, written as prompts, using the postcard for inspiration. Many will be reworked and polished. Look for them and others in my poetry chapbook, available at the end of the year.

Thanks for reading...

I can be seen/heard reading three of these postcard poems from a session that drew our Poetry Postcard Fest to an end of September 2, 2021. There are many beautiful poems to observe from an abundance of talent, but mine are found from 7:45 - 10:30. https://ppf.cascadiapoeticslab.org/2021/09/05/post-fest-open-mic-video/