#jp grasser

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And we danced too, you know, at weddings and wakes, in basements and churches, even when the war was on.

JP Grasser

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Letter to My Great, Great Grandchild

after Matthew Olzmann

Oh button, don’t go thinking we loved pianos more than elephants, air conditioning more than air.

We loved honey, just loved it, and went into stores to smell the sweet perfume of unworn leather shoes.

Did you know, on the coast of Africa, the Sea Rose and Carpenter Bee used to depend on each other?

The petals only opened for the Middle C their wings beat, so in the end, we protested with tuning forks.

You must think we hated the stars, the empty ladles, because they conjured thirst. We didn’t. We thanked

them and called them lucky, we even bought the rights to name them for our sweethearts. Believe it or not,

most people kept plants like pets and hired kids like you to water them, whenever they went away.

And ice! Can you imagine? We put it in our coffee and dumped it out at traffic lights, when it plugged up

our drinking straws. I had a dog once, a real dog, who ate venison and golden yams from a plastic dish.

He was stubborn, but I taught him to dance and play dead with a bucket full of chicken livers. And we danced

too, you know, at weddings and wakes, in basements and churches, even when the war was on. Our cars

we mostly named for animals, and sometimes we drove just to drive, to clear our heads of everything but wind.

J.P. GRASSER