Ten Words for Sorrow

Ten Words for Sorrow

When my great-grandmother

discovered she was the last speaker

of the mid-west dialect,

she ditched her songs

of wind and tumbleweed

to mime for me

ten words for sorrow.

Her garments were eased

to show a sorrow that salted

deep folds in her skin.

That rose and hooked

the back of her throat.

That contoured

into an hourglass,

squeezing the very rasp

out of her. And how

the same word, with new

inflection, connoted a type

that dripped slowly,

tipped her over,

then trickled again.

She taught me

the word for sorrow

that out-shrieks darkness.

That descends like gauze,

yet no beast can rip through.

A kind that fastens itself

to the span of just one day

or to a rusted peg

where cast-off jackets droop.

And when her hands

measured empty space, I saw

it made a difference whether sorrow

remained the vehicle,

or became the entire road.

© Katie Griffiths