When Grandma Lived Just Three Houses Away

Remembering my grandmother Alice,
cigarette smoke and a story
rising from her ever-creaking Lazyboy.

She covers me in warm attention
like the heavy afghans she knits for my family.

The radio is silent,
she turned off the baseball game when I arrived,
and a pile of books lie next to her like a sleeping dog,
closed and quiet,
waiting for me to leave.