For His Grandmother, Long Gone

His long white car sat askew, parked across his grandmother’s sidewalk.
The front fender grazed the chain-link fence covered in St. Therese’s roses.
In the morning, broken stems and petals lay limp on the on the ground around his tires.

How foolish to think she would sleep through our 3 am absurdity.
Our impulses numbed by alcohol, his lack of concern, my oblivious compliance.
The ancestor’s sepia-lidded eyes watched us with disapproval. This was their home.

At her Sunday morning table, the two of us sweat drink and soiled skin.
He expected a meal, her quiet tongue, and told her to speak English.
With her back to us, surely she cursed us from her stove.

She scrambled eggs, chopped vegetables, and warmed beans and tortillas.
I felt her anger simmer, severe as the part in her dark hair.
Her soft hands trembled as she served us, her lined face still.

I thanked her, my appreciation sincere. She nodded and looked through me.
As she left the room, she patted the scapular in the gully of her chest.
I imagined she begged the Virgin Mother to save him from me.