ACCOMODATIONS

The first thing Ida does when 

She finds herself in a poem

Is to measure it and see if 

It's big enough to take in a boarder

Maybe two when times get hard;

She turns on taps, knocks on walls,

Looks for east-facing windows

Where her plants can watch the sun rise.

Then she demands to see the landlord.

I hadn't planned for this and

I'm wearing green pajamas but 

I've seen her picture; Ida has wrestled

Death to a draw; I enter the poem.

"Yes? You wanted to see me?"

"Of course. I want to see the lease."

"Lease? This is a poem, Ida, not an apartment!

And how could I charge you rent?

You're my great-grandmother, dead

Since 1943."

                      "Still, I'll feel better 

With a lease. If you decide to throw me out

I'll want warning."

                                

"Who's throwing you out? Why would I do that?"

"Maybe you'll find a better ancestor. Jenny, say,

Or Zlotte or even Taube (maybe not Taube;

There's nothing much to say about her).

Then whoosh! I'm back in the grave

And Lena Lemport is watering my Boston fern."

"Fine. You can have a lease." "Alright.

Was that so hard? Sit. I'll make tea

And we'll talk about the plumbing.

(I ran a bathhouse; I  know from plumbing.)"