I Miss Your Batatas Grandma
written by: Kimber-Lee Basson
I remember you from last winter when I was thirteen.
Christmas cups
and oven-baked sweet batatas.
Silver hair,
daughter of the sun.
You were not made for exile
but for exhale.
Show me the carved-out map to heaven.
Braid my scalp with volcanoes, Grandma.
I am hungry for your
sweet jams,
roasted beetroot,
and beef fat
climbing up to my ravenous mouth.
Your umami depth turned food to melt in one’s mouth.
Always starving — if not for your food,
then for your presence,
my belonging.
I don’t belong anywhere;
Belonging somewhere is never enough.
On Earth,
our wings are clipped by social media.
A stiff,
hardened dance under neon lights,
noise without meaning!
They tell millennials to make honey in winter,
and to crave the season of endless attention.
You’re either a seasonal species,
a background noise,
swallowed whole.
I hum your laughter,
sacred and kind.
At thirty,
I still whisper your name.
A soft song in your sunlit kitchen.
I didn’t know that your departure
meant parts of me would stay behind.
I weep your existence,
Grand-Ma.
NOTE:
Based on the Prompt – Echoes of Unyielding Voices
- I Miss Your Batatas Grandma - April 8, 2026
- Your Silence is The Biggest Crime in Gaza - December 8, 2025
- Spotlight On Writers – Kimber-Lee Basson - September 20, 2025
