I traveled under the mountains and thought of those from whom I come
Traveling down into the darkness with no promise of survival, for survival
I think of her memory,
of her watching her mama learn her intuition was strong, learn her son had died, there underneath the earth, there in the darkness
Her story, through her telling, became mine
And though the house was different, I pictured her mama, there in my grandma’s kitchen, peeling potatoes
I pictured their front door and the knock that must have hit it like a lump of coal
And that sinking feeling that the world would not be the same again