to the Big Lake Michigan
with grampa and the fat poodle Pierre
and the neighbor's German shepherd Duke
that grama called a police dog
On Sunday we could not do anything
grama and grampa were Dutch reformed
so we couldn't watch TV or cook
I could walk with grampa in the woods
But that wasn't why I liked Sunday lake days best
I didn't like Sunday because it was boring
But I did like being at the lake which was not boring
Sunday was best because it felt like it would never end
you could get lost in the woods for always
I told grampa I wanted to live there forever
in a little hut I'd imagined I'd make
I'd live on chewing gum wintergreen berries
and make pancakes from acorns
Grampa said I'd soon get sick of it and come home
it was nice to think of grama who never lake walked
waiting at home with the lazy dog
who had given up and braunschweiger sandwiches
But I haven't forgotten my Lake Michigan
back dune woods mind fort
made of beach grass and driftwood
like African kids' cozy hut homes
in my Grama L's Childcraft books
My grandson Milo felt quite the same thing
when we went Sunday walkabout at Lake Michigan
We agreed we'd like to live there for always
in the big sand dunes with tall beach grass
in a cantonment we'd make for ourselves
and sister Juno of sand-scrubbed sticks
tied together with maram grass
dining on berries and nuts and such
I am very sure that my mind fort of 5
is the same one 5-year-old he sees too
If only there was the grama grampa house
with sandwiches and them waiting for us
I'm the grama now, making sandwiches
at the Omi-Opi house for after walk Sundays
I see the old treasured faces in now people loved
I meet grama and grampa in them, again
such is the circle unbroken.
Selah
(love, Omi Sachteleben)
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