Free Revolutionary Petunias by Alice Walker

Burial
    I
    They have fenced in the dirt road
    that once led to Wards Chapel
    A.M.E. church,
    and cows graze
    among the stones that
    mark my family’s graves.
    The massive oak is gone
    from out the church yard,
    but the giant space is left
    unfilled;
    despite the two-lane blacktop
    that slides across
    the old, unalterable
    roots.
    II
    Today I bring my own child here;
    to this place where my father’s
    grandmother rests undisturbed
    beneath the Georgia sun,
    above her the neatstepping hooves
    of cattle.
    Here the graves soon grow back into the land.
    Have been known to sink. To drop open without
    warning. To cover themselves with wild ivy,
    blackberries. Bittersweet and sage.
    No one knows why. No one asks.
    When Burning Off Day comes, as it does
    some years,
    the graves are haphazardly cleared and snakes
    hacked to death and burned sizzling
    in the brush. … The odor of smoke, oak
    leaves, honeysuckle.
    Forgetful of geographic resolutions as birds,
    the farflung young fly South to bury
    the old dead.
    III
    The old women move quietly up
    and touch Sis Rachel’s face.
    “Tell Jesus I’m coming,” they say.
    “Tell Him I ain’t goin’ to be
    long.”
    My grandfather turns his creaking head
    away from the lavender box.
    He does not cry. But looks afraid.
    For years he called her “Woman”;
    shortened over the decades to
    “ ’Oman.”
    On the cut stone for “ ’Oman’s” grave
    he did not notice
    they had misspelled her name.
    (The stone reads Racher Walker —not “Rachel”— Loving Wife, Devoted Mother .)
    IV
    As a young woman, who had known her? Tripping
    eagerly, “loving wife,” to my grandfather’s
    bed. Not pretty, but serviceable. A hard
    worker, with rough, moist hands. Her own two
    babies dead before she came.
    Came to seven children.
    To aprons and sweat.
    Came to quiltmaking.
    Came to canning and vegetable gardens
    big as fields.
    Came to fields to plow.
    Cotton to chop.
    Potatoes to dig.
    Came to multiple measles, chickenpox,
    and croup.
    Came to water from springs.
    Came to leaning houses one story high.
    Came to rivalries. Saturday night battles.
    Came to straightened hair, Noxzema, and
    feet washing at the Hardshell Baptist church.
    Came to zinnias around the woodpile.
    Came to grandchildren not of her blood
    whom she taught to dip snuff without
    sneezing.
    ____________
    Came to death blank, forgetful of it all.
    When he called her “ ’Oman” she no longer
    listened. Or heard, or knew, or felt.
    V
    It is not until I see my first grade teacher
    review her body that I cry.
    Not for the dead, but for the gray in my
    first grade teacher’s hair. For memories
    of before I was born, when teacher and
    grandmother loved each other; and later
    above the ducks made of soap and the orange-
    legged chicks Miss Reynolds drew over
    my own small hand
    on paper with wide blue lines.
    VI
    Not for the dead, but for memories. None of
    them sad. But seen from the angle of her
    death.

For My Sister Molly Who in the Fifties
    Once made a fairy rooster from
    Mashed potatoes
    Whose eyes I forget
    But green onions were his tail
    And his two legs were carrot sticks
    A tomato slice his crown.
    Who came home on vacation
    When the sun was hot
    and cooked
    and cleaned
    And minded least of all
    The children’s questions
    A million or more
    Pouring in on her
    Who had been to school
    And knew (and told us too) that certain
    Words were no longer good
    And taught me not to say us for we
    No matter what “Sonny said” up the
    road.
    FOR MY SISTER MOLLY WHO IN THE FIFTIES
    Knew Hamlet well and read into the night
    And coached me in my songs of Africa
    A continent I never knew
    But learned to love
    Because “they” she said could carry
    A tune
    And spoke in accents never heard
    In Eatonton.
    Who read from Prose and Poetry
    And loved to read “Sam McGee from Tennessee”
    On nights the fire was burning low
    And Christmas wrapped in angel hair
    And I for one prayed for snow.
    WHO IN THE FIFTIES
    Knew all the written