My mother ran the store
we lived behind. Some mornings
I'd find her spread
between both worlds.

With one hand she straightened
shirts, with the other vacuumed the rug.
She did it in memory of hunger 
and fear of the coming drought.

Her store was full of mannequins
whose cold bodies turned
my skin blue. She filled her house
with plastic flowers, just as good,

she would say, as the others,
but not in need of constant care.
I remember how my sister and I
would always be told to share,

in memory of grandfather's frozen crop,
in honor of his early death,
in hope for the coming spring
when things would get better,

when mannequins would grow flesh
as warm and as soft as a dollar bill.