my grandmother has a plastic lawn

& the lawn men come
to mow it twice a week & she sits 
in a floating arm chair while she watches
them work out the front bay window.
they have hair on their arms.
they have great muscles.
my grandmother has a feather dusters 
& she dusts the busts on her mantel--
the head of athena & the skull of her mother.
she wants to be reminded 
that there's a long beaded necklace
of mothers. she sneezes from the dust.
she plucks feathers out of the duster
& sticks one in her hair
to feel beautiful. my grandmother 
grows plastic flowers on her porch.
they're non-specific: blue & purple.
a plastic bruise on the porch.
they don't drink the water so 
it just spills. some nights she feeds
the plastic flowers-- cutting her
meals on wheels side dishes in half
& dropping them with a fork 
on the flower's petals. she want
to feed the men who mow the lawn 
but can't bother them because they're working.
my grandmother died a few years ago
& this is a different grandmother--
one almost everyone has but doesn't visit
because she won't remember them 
or she lives too far away in a box 
on the moon. on her kitchen table
is a bowl full of plastic grapes & when i was little
i used to pluck one off & slip
it into my mouth to chew on. alone 
at the table she does the same-- gnawing 
on the purple orb-- wondering
if maybe she chews it long enough 
it might become a sweet morsel. outside the lawn
smells like burning rubber. the man is gone 
so my grandmother crosses herself & sighs,
remembering his large company. 
she goes back to feeding her flowers
& says eat up, you want to grow up 
to be real flowers.