Grandma Loeppky
by Dwight J. Friesen
There are still moments
when I measure love
by the way your face opened
before a single word was spoken.
As though delight
could arrive ahead of me,
already setting another place
at the table.
You welcomed me
the way morning welcomes windows—
not asking whether
I had earned the light.
The floor became a holy place:
buttons strung into impossible necklaces,
crayons wearing themselves to stubs,
stories wandering beyond the last page
because neither of us
was in a hurry.
At night,
your voice folded over me
like another afghan,
each Little Golden Book
stitching together
what the daylight
had quietly unraveled.
You knew my favorite meals
before I knew
I was hungry for more than food.
Only years later
did I discover
that what nourished me most
was not your cooking,
nor the stories,
nor the games.
It was the strange miracle
of being wanted
before I could become
someone worth wanting.
Even now,
when I try to imagine
the love of G-d,
or the shape of belonging,
it is your smile that arrives first—
your eyes saying,
without ever saying it,
There you are.
I was hoping it would be you.
And perhaps
every true love
is only this:
someone whose joy
meets you
before your shame can,
whose welcome
becomes the place
your soul returns to
whenever it forgets
it has always
belonged.
Peace, dwight
“Grandma Loeppky”
