Last night while I was washing dishes,
I said to my daughter, “How do you like them apples?”
and she said, “What does that mean?”
which means she never knew you.
Funny how when I said it, I heard your voice,
not my own.
I told her, “Oh, that’s something my grandma
used to say. It just means, How do you like that?”
I didn’t cry then, thinking of how you never met,
but I did cry about it later. She wears your name,
just as I do, you know. Rose. There is sorrow and honor
in that one long-stemmed syllable.
I know you would love her.
She likes to dress up, even wears the shiny blue sparkling
clip on earrings I saved from you. Someday
perhaps, when she is a mother,
standing beside the kitchen sink,
her hands warm with soapy water,
she’ll be telling a story and finish it up with
“How do you like them apples?”
And if her child looks at her
in that curious way, she’ll reply,
“It’s just something my mother used to say.”
Love,
Rosemerry