Sun City, Arizona - A Reminscem
I’ve teased for awhile that I would share some of my old poetry with my ‘modern’ commentary on it. I’ve christened this a Reminiscem (reminisce + poem). This is probably unnecessary given what a poem is in the first place, but I’m feeling the word play at this moment.
The first poem is an ode to my grandfather written before he passed away. It feels appropriate as we enter the holiday season which often brings family together. First the poem:
Sun City, Arizona
The gleaners come today
to clear the sunkissed trees of
their heavy loads;
the thick-skinned grapefruit,
bulging lemons,
the inflamed oranges.
The hummingbirds dart
whirring their wings;
they watch too.
From the windows with
twenty year old curtains,
he is thin and peeved.
Pedro has replaced him, but
only Grandpa knows the way
branches are pruned.
The fruit trees bend down
too many long days pull
them towards the soil.
The scent of skin and juice
is in the air, trapped by gravity.
Grandpa turns to me,
a bright pink pill shaking in hand.
He wants to reach the year 2000.
And gesturing outside,
he reassures me that
it’s not too hot,
the gleaners have gotten
an early start.
Commentary: This poem captures not only my grandfather, but many memories of my grandparent’s home in Arizona. They had lemon and grapefruit trees amid rose bushes (their favorite) in their pebble-filled backyard. I remember this backyard through squinting eyes because it was always so bright, so constantly sunny in Arizona. When I was a teenager visiting them, I would lie in that backyard tanning myself and seeing how long I could take the relentless heat. There were the hummingbirds but also jackrabbits to watch through the sliding glass door when you retreated inside for the air conditioning.
My grandfather was a hard man to know, but he opened up a bit towards the end of his life. This poem was one of those moments. I was in college spending some time with them in August when this happened. And even though I was young and in many ways couldn’t understand, it was notable even then. With his gruff exterior, I often didn’t feel my grandfather’s desires, his yearning, but he took such pride in everything he did, most of it earned and produced by his hands over a hard life. When I caught him peering through the curtains, he seemed so fragile yet his words were so assertive. It seems like in that moment I already knew he wouldn’t last much longer, but I was really hoping he could.
But maybe that’s also a sense-making story I tell myself now. He died in 1998, and when I was reading this at a poetry reading my senior year of college, I burst into tears.
Some of my poems I feel like I have an adult perspective that differs from my younger self. But this one is not that. This moment feels very frozen in time and suspended for me. If I were there with my grandfather now, I think I would feel the same naive sense of dread and hope.
