Grandma's Obeah

Her’s was a wooden palace,

Softened under the weight,

Of ten thousand damp mornings.

The walls perfumed every space,

With the pungent sweet smell,

Of mold and rot.

It was within the hollow staccato

Heartbeat of halls of hallowed stucco

I watched the magic of the mundane.

The heft of an aged body leaning

Into an amorphous mass of dough

That promised to be bread,

The duet of crackling fires and arthritic fingers,

Conjuring humble sacraments on the hearth,

Calling us to communion on the floor.

I still hear her raspy voice over moments,

Of reverent silences ushered in by

Tales of the voice of God in thunder.