Spring 2015
Haviland China by Kathleen Cassen Mickelson
Faded pink roses, still sweet, bloom
across thin white porcelain plates
and tea cups through which light leaks.
Paper towels cradle each plate as
old bones cradled in soft blankets.
Your grandmother bought these dishes
a place setting at a time,
from the milk man. Her treasure grew,
week by week, in the china
hutch in the dining room of that house
on Wales Street, in St. Paul,
the one you never saw.
You don’t remember your
grandmother, dead by the time
you were six months old.
Later, your mother
used these dishes on holidays,
her hands as thin and delicate as
the plates. You were so careful
to keep your fork from hitting
that ethereal porcelain, from breaking
any of these links to your past.
Nevertheless, some are missing. Some are cracked.
Then your mother
wanted to sell them,
you objected. You begged.
The Linnet's Wings Poetry
Finally you bought
this partial set of memories
from a woman who feared she might miss
receiving the full worth of
her own touchstone.
You, on the other hand, knew
your money would buy
an incomplete service of love.