Once, she was all legs and hair, red as brick,
Smartly dressed in homemade suits, Jackie O pillbox hats, white gloves, and matching shoes on Sundays,

Yet even so she was the maker of midnight bread, driver of H-Farmall tractors, mother of toddlers, and worker of the soil—

Stronger than wrinkles and hair dye.

A thousand stories line her face and cut deep grooves into garden-battered hands.
But she still wears rouge and lipstick,
Combs her hair with two mirrors,
And asks me to look for bald spots.

I see none.

No more than I see wrinkles where life has left its bittersweet imprint
On paper white cheeks I love.

        --My Grandmother in Two Mirrors , Deborah R. Huso