They come back in their white
shifts, their ruffled shawls of salt
white, the way the dead always return
when you need them the most—
when it’s too hot to do anything
but picture the worst—the Bomb
finally fallen, the world burned-up,
the entire planet radioactive—
when you are too weak to do anything
but lie in a stupor and call them back
to drift at your side, in eyelet dresses
of old starlight, fresh-faced and cold.
it seems as if she is talking of the earth, not just grandmothers. “they come back in their white shifts, their ruffled shawls of salt white…” its like the ocean and the beach. you can disturb the sand ,but a new wave will always come over it and make it right