family reunion
by Ellen White
My cousin and I have been looking for Bridget Reynold’s grave for twenty years. Lots of Reynolds. Just one Cornelius. On the headstone: Bridget, his Wife cut sharp beneath the date of death. We want Bridget, his daughter, our great-grandmother, married to the Protestant Samuel Hobson. Death tore them asunder. Buried him beside Beloved Parents in an unmarked grave. Buried her across town with the Irish.
How is your husband? How are your children? I look for Bridget in a clutter of stone stubs. I scrape loose sod with my sneaker. Poke leaf piles where the caretaker dumps broken stones. No bent plaque. No half-buried slab. No random rubble carved with B or R. My cousin follows the same path through weeds and under trees, as if we are each other’s shadow. Or ghost. Why are we looking for her? What do we expect to find? The obituary proves she’s buried in this cemetery.
After mass, our mothers broke fast on unmounded grass, afraid to ladder stockings or greenstain skirts. Scraped lichen, dead-headed daisies and gobbled hardboiled eggs sprinkled with paper twists of salt. We look for Bridget even though she bought the other son a brand new car. Grandfather pushed his jalopy in between the house and barn. Doused it with gasoline. Lit a cigarette and tossed the match. His father was a fireman. Did she run to the window? Did the damp clothes burn? Weeds burst. Lichen harms no one.
What will granite give us? The house, the barn, the clothesline in between, the rain barrel, grape arbor, the car’s burnt metal corpse: dug up, scraped out, paved over. We took turns shoveling soil into our mothers’ graves. Maps erase the street. 2020. 2021. 2022. 2023. 2,473 memorials marked with plutonic stone. We postpone scheduling the family reunion. Daughters marry. Sons graduate. The other family reunion competes. Last chance glaciers at the national park.
I swear my mother saw that car burning before she was born. I still feel the heat. How long did it burn?
Photo of Ellen White
BIO: Ellen White is a poet, writer, and contemplative arts teacher who recently moved to South Portland, Maine. Retired from a career in IT she now offers writing workshops and leads retreats that combine meditation, movement, and writing. She holds a MFA from Lindenwood University and has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize. Suspended, her first collection of poetry, was released by Cathexis Northwest Press in May 2023. Visit her website at ellenwhiterook.com.