daisy bowl

i loved to have breakfast with her ghost.
aunt joan with her mouth full of sugar.
she didn't know how to do anything
but laugh. in the morning at my great aunt's
the portraits would come alive too. 
a child version of my father played
with metal cars on the thick carpet.
all the family's cats and dogs chasing each other.
that summer i wanted to join them.
become an ancestor & worry in new ways
about the color of sun. i used one bowl
from the kitchen over & over. it was chipped
& white with a brown daisy pattern 
on the belly. i relished that dawn glow.
light shining off the bowl's rim. i filled it
with oatmeal and then water. stood in front 
of the microwave as it cooked my breakfast.
aunt joan hummed to herself. always asked
for her own bowl which i'd pour her,
just to pour it out again. 
she told me, "aren't you beautiful."
the television turned on by itself.
all the ghosts argued over what to watch.
i let them. channeled blooming from
one another. we almost always settled
on the news. a new kind of gun. a fire.
a car crash without any birds.
the ghosts always turned to me to ask,
"is it going to be okay?" i think the job
of the living is maybe to lie to the dead
& vice versa. i told them, "yes, yes it is."
they always relaxed then. a weight lifted. 
television snow. aunt mary was always
the next to wake up. she'd make 
her instant coffee & come to sit 
with all of us in the living room.
i'd wash my bowl out & the ghosts
would pack up their eyes. climb back
into portraits. i know she saw them too.