Two Poems by Kevin Nance

A Visitation

1
I wake to the scent
of grandma’s lilac hand cream
wafting in the air.

2
Do the dead return?
If not, whose fingers are these
pulling at my sleeve?

3
The aroma shifts
to lard, buttermilk, her hands
moving in the flour.

4
Hot from the oven,
her biscuits are ridged on top
where she pressed them down.

5
Her apron comes loose
at the back and she lets me
tie the strings again.

6
I go to bed with
Beechnut snuff and Doublemint
gum, sweet on her breath.

Back from the Funeral

Daddy’s dead but the wash is still wet,
so Mama and I stand side by side
at the strand of fence wire strung between the pecan trees
in the orchard late this breezy afternoon,
her mouth full of clothespins
so no word between us, no sound at all
but our breathing in, breathing out,
as I hand her my Cloroxed T-shirts to hang on the line,
the wind filling their sleeves as if with shoulders,
our own shoulders touching,
our own arms splayed like the limbs of these trees
that have sheltered us all our lives,
holding off the setting sun.