The Essential Wisdom of Cool Aunts

 A memory of Dorothy Gilmore

She ran the Rec Center on Rowan Street,

hosting booze-free youth nights 

spun from a jukebox and local bands. 

To me she was only Aunt Dot, 

but my friends remember Mrs. G, 

everyone’s cool aunt 

whose kitchen was always open 

to teens in need of commiseration, 

which was how she caught word 

of my early flirtation with Rio,

a mysterious pixie with lightning eyes 

who wore her skirts short and sweaters tight. 

I loved the rush of her wild allure 

and she was keen on my letter jacket – 

we might’ve made it work, 

but Aunt Dot was wise. 

I can’t recall her actual words, 

but still feel the inflection: 

You were made for so much more. 

The girl is not your kind. 

By which she could’ve meant ‘cool.’ 

I kept the jacket and lost the girl 

who would be old and gray by now, 

not an abuela who nods by the fire, 

but a wayward girl’s great aunt 

who weaves a spell from shadowed years 

to cast away the sting of tears 

and tame the fear her beauty bore: 

You’re so much more than meets his eye. 

The boy is not your kind. 

Grandpa Gilmore Left Me a Poem

I’d heard he earned a medal somehow 

late in the Great War, capturing a squad, 

or perhaps a platoon of German troops. 

Hell, he said, through plumes of blue smoke 

rising from an end-table ashtray littered 

with unfiltered Camels. Grandpa paused. 

The Friday night fights flickered.

We listened to the Gillette jingle 

as welterweights bounced in their corners. 

Hell, I was lost in the fog,  when a shell 

burst nearby. I like t'shit'm'britches –

a bell pierced the ring-side shouts –

so I jumped in the nearest trench 

which was full of … Granpa winked 

and shot a sly smile … full of the finest 

German gentlemen, who threw up 

their hands before I could raise mine. 

His husky laugh dissolved into coughs 

and I thought I heard scattered jeers 

as weary boxers clinched on the ropes, 

pounding to the final bell. 

Grandpa came home, but not quite 

whole, his left leg locked stiff for life. 

I’m sure he could've cursed with flair, 

but deferred for his bride. Tamed 

into temperance by stomach ulcers, 

he moved through his days with a dignified limp 

and always left a room laughing. 

We shared Grandpa’s jokes at his funeral – 

that was his gift to a too-solemn world. 

He'd left me a well-creased poem, 

a cheesy paean to partisan peace 

which I read to embittered fraternity brothers 

the week after Nixon squeaked in. I mouthed 

the earnest platitudes to weary groans, 

till eyeing our tidy Republican tribe, 

I channeled my grandpa, shot a sly smile,  

and landed the final lines –  I’ll hug your elephant 

and you kiss my ass. 

Here is a link to "The View from Grandma's Kitchen"

and here's a link to the post-election poem.