perfect

It began raining just as the funeral ended. 

I was ten. Mattie's cheeks looked

so terribly pink - so much blush,

and not her - in the coffin for viewing.

I sat in the car behind Grandma and asked,

“Will we get perfect bodies in heaven?”

And she exclaimed, “Yes! I’ll be skinny!”

I was puzzled. My grandma 

was already perfect

for holding and hugging

and feeling like home.

She was that kind of warm-soft-full-safe 

that says silently, close your eyes, 

rest here forever at home in my arms.

I could not - I still can't 

wrap my baffled mind round

a heaven that shrinks my grandma down 

from perfect to bone-hard-less-huggable skinny,

or an earth that convinces my grandma that in 

that place we call heaven we'll lose, 

I through her, 

the soft huggable curves

that made room for my mother who

made room for me, the safe mama-home fullness

that's already perfect to me.