The letters are lacy, vintage, bound well along the ends with sturdy strong sounds.

“Grandmother.”

She drapes the word like a shawl around her shoulders, finding comfort in its earthy warm color and unexpected worn softness.

Curling her body into a tight little ball, she slips easily within the concentric “o’s” of “mother” and “grandmother,” a place of unnoticed power and unlimited pride.

She whispers the baby’s new name as if it were magic, unraveling each pronounced sound, stringing them together to form a first memory.

And later tonight, under the watchful guidance of a perfect full moon, she will weave this name next to her own, using the delicate tender threads to create a new circle.

(For Lisa, world’s happiest grandmother)

Copyright 2013