GREAT UNCLE EDGAR AT GRANDMOTHER'S FUNERAL They were twins, born at the end of the last century Of rugged stock in the hardscrabble farm country Of central Maine. She raised six children and wrote poetry, Surviving two husbands, while he was a dairy farmer, Spare of words, who married late and lost his wife. Because the pull of blood is strong, they found each other Again, taking up old age together, uneasily, After lives apart. He accused her of having gentleman callers, And she fussed at his quirks, like picking up pennies, But he always told her, with bred-in-the-bone frugality, That two cents was a down payment on a postage stamp. They kept each other warm with cats in winter and put out a garden Every spring until their ninetieth year. And when They moved into the rest home, they traded hands of rummy Until she dozed or he lost track, since he heard less and less And wandered more and more around the grounds, looking For his cows. The day Grandmother died, the nurses said He didn't know the difference, but his niece took him To the funeral parlor, where he sat beside the open casket For the longest time without a word. Then, looking at her, He said, with slight annoyance, "Well, Eva, play your card!" She already had. Her hand was blessed by the King of Hearts, And a better game was just beginning. Maybe Edgar really Understood and was hurling all his wit, with brave recall, Against the loss, for afterward he sometimes crept Into her room, where he sat in the creaky old rocker, And the silence ached with that lonesome scrannel sound. -- Tom Orr, from "Hammers in the Fog," (1995/Restoration Press, Indianapolis, IN), copyrighted material posted with permission. This tender tribute to sibling love was composed by Thomas Alan Orr, born in Bangor, ME, who grew up in the hill country of western MA. He graduated from Gordon College and moved to Indianapolis in 1972, has worked in human services and work force development. He has Scotch-Irish roots. Tom is a member of the Writers' Center of Indianapolis, and since 1986 has lived on a small farm in Shelby Co, where he raises rabbits and poultry.