‘It takes a village to raise a child’ YORUBA PROVERB
The rest of us are dressed for January’s
damp chill but she greets us on the driveway in
cool boots, black tights, black skirt, white shirt, and red cloak
Grandma has made for TikTok performances.
She smiles briefly, then gurns. A homemade cake
is brought carefully through the front door,
with candles blazing, duly blown out.
We sing the song, and mark her eleven years
upon the earth. She is lovely, lithe, and kind.
The cake goes back, returns sliced, on paper plates.
Our gifts are unwrapped in the open boot
of the family car – clothes, books, poem.
We are an innovative species –
and stoical. The very lightest of
drizzles begins to fall.
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By David Selzer