Glorified

It’s said that at the moment of death,
our ancestors will appear
at the foot of the bed, beckoning.
We will be blinded by the light,
squinting to see the transfigured faces
of those waiting for us in heaven
as we gasp our final inhalation.

Granny, no longer toothless and demented,
will meet me with a box of cannoli,
fresh from Rispoli’s Bakery.
She is shining, young again,
though I’d thought she was always old,
with her hair ribboned in a silver coronet,
braided as our lives entwined years ago

when I was restless and ten, running
down the city blocks of West New York
while, in the kitchen, she rolled and cut
cavatelli for the interminable Sunday dinners.

A window into heaven is opened
only by death. Bedazzled, Granny and I
will embrace, her skinny arms
no longer burdened by plates of pasta,
my tongue no longer weighed down
by clumsy English words, but
speaking la bella lingua.

Look! She rides in on a mythical broom
like La Befana at Christmastide.
Then, frolicking in a cement garden,
she plays hide-and-seek behind a fig tree,
smiling among the laundry. Granny,
I’m coming.