Georgann Prochaska
We Need More Grandmothers
Grandma’s magical world
braided to the ordinary.
She tucked rock-like peaches
into sauna brown lunch bags.
Days later peach juice ran
down my chin with each bite.
To music we marched around the table—
dishes, toys, laundry
found their proper place.
When I wailed with a scraped knee,
spit hit her fingertips.
She brushed away blood.
“Go play. Let the air get to it.”
Her archipelago never coddled
but kept children safe.
Buds became blooms.
She didn’t know
a cinematic blizzard of dangers
awaited children.
Puffed up voices with murderous rules
questioned children eating peaches,
Playtime in trees, fresh air,
being safe in a grandmother’s arms.
In this new catawampus world,
full of hyperbole and sickness,
where nurturing children
hurts an authority’s bottom line,
Grandma would have stood up,
Bible in hand,
and marched.
“Shame on the brutes and cowards.”
My grandmother was like that.
Most grandmothers are,
and they grow well-rooted flowers,
not broken spirits.
Georgann Prochaska grew up in the Chicago area, studied literature at Illinois State University, and taught high school for thirty-four years. After retiring, she became a caregiver and learned about suspicions and secrets from her mother who had Alzheimer’s Disease. Those discoveries spun her into writing mysteries—two grandmothers, a Vietnam veteran, and a bloodhound. The Case of the Girl Who Didn’t Smile (Outskirts Press, 2015), The Case of the Hound Who Didn’t Stay (Outskirts Press, 2016), The Case of the Ex Who Plotted Revenge (Outskirts Press, 2017), Murder Comes To The Vineyard (Outskirts Press, 2016), and Murder Comes to Grindstone (Outskirts Press, 2019) are the five installments in the series to date.
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