NaPoWriMo Day 3: Elegy for Mythical Grandpas

Late posting. Didn't wanna go off-prompt. Took a while to think of who to elegize (made that up and I'm using it).

Elegy for Mythical Grandpas

For the longest time, you thought

he was a soldier, a sailor. Nope.

Only a sailor’s cook. Didn’t know

what he cooked (American?) or

where he sailed, didn’t know he had

a younger brother,

or another family (American, as legend has it)

were told he could stuff you in a rice sack

and tie you to the branch of a guava tree.

For the longest time, you believed

he possessed nothing but anger and fear,

like a frying pan on fire, maybe having nothing to smile about

while being painted (his only existing portrait).

Now you try to picture him

boldly laughing with babies in his arms;

now you try to taste his cooking

through your sister’s; now you try

to describe all the silver linings

growing out of the head of this beast.