THE GRANDMOTHER SONG

Florence Fitzsimmons, one of the first women in her area who rode for pleasure -

she rode well into her sixties. Note the wagon to the right. No cars then!

February 14, 1998

I wear my grandmother's ring

for medicine.

Rubbing my fingers over it,

I feel my connection

to her

and to the long line of old, wise women

who came before her,

who walked the grandmother path
before she

who walked here

before me.

One of them was a healer;

one of them spoke with ghosts.

In my past are Celtic crones

and warrior women,

mystics and dream weavers.

In my past, women galloped
on horseback

across the plains,

gave birth in tents, in covered wagons
and in captivity.

A medicine woman
is back there,

and an Untouchable,

a witch and a nun.

In my past are bent, exhausted
and determined women,

digging in the unyielding earth

trying to feed their children

during the potato famine.

Once in vision

row upon row of silent,
dead-eyed women

wrapped in blankets,

I saw, weaving their way

through the frozen blackness
of a winter morning

in the Gulag

and, with a chill, I knew them,

and knew I had been there.

Somewhere back there

there was a woman of vision

and a fool.

Somewhere back there,
wise women sat around a fire

in Council,

speaking truth and governing.

Somewhere back there,

women were

burned at the stake.

Some raised swords
and led armies on horseback.

Some were shackled together
in a ship's hold

to be sold as slaves.

Some lived in castles
and some in caves.

Somewhere back there,

once women's spirits flew;

somewhere back there

our souls were
kept in bondage.

Somewhere back there

our feet were cruelly bound.

Somewhere back there
we threw off

all the bindings
and stood tall.

And now I am watching
my grandmother's face

emerging before me daily
in the mirror.

My grandmother's eyes
are looking out of my face.

They know me.

Somewhere from within

my grandmother has told me

to put on the ring:

for now I am worthy.

I, the baby grandmother,

just coming into my power.

No longer a granddaughter,

now an elfin granddaughter
walks beside me, looking up,

and the vast peaceful knowing

that lived in my grandmother's heart

has come to reside within me.

I wear my grandmother's ring

for love, for memory,

for connection

to the line of strong women
who came here before me

and for the line of strong women

who will walk here behind me,

for the passage of time

that is timeless,

for the circle of love

that is endless,

for the circle of life
that keeps turning and turning:

one grandmother out,

one granddaughter in,

footsteps walking in footsteps,

heart upon heart,

all the way Home.