Elizabeth's House

My grandmother on good mornings
taught me phrases like "hunter green"
the color of her dense carpet,
wall to wall,
and the shade lighter -- avocado,
of the sweeping fabric drapes
tugging, relentless,
at the curtain rods layered
in brassy gold.

The upholstery she chose
for the living room couch,
that's textured ivory, she’d said --
patterns of tiny white blisters,
little knobs of fiber, tightly woven
like love letters in Braille
like something sure
and never-changing
against my palms.

But beyond
the living room
the dining room
even the embroidered hand towels
and matching wicker accents
of the bathroom

beyond all this --

small, brown plastic bottles
with white ribbed lids
lined the kitchen counter

green and black pills
to calm the nerves
and other colors
and reasons
I don't remember.

the oven timer
buzzing and buzzing,
the sign,
the signal,
the bottles of vodka
perfectly cold.

And the stained recliner
hidden, in the den
where she sat for years,
staring out onto what?

oil wells pumping
livestock prices climbing
money pouring in.

Yet she drank her days well
into her nights,
her home decorated
with balls of wadded tissue
around her feet,
everything wet

walls absorbing
sadness
darkening
soaking in

finally
turning
alabaster gray
into a cloth
of simple black.

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