I awaken to the island smells
Of August breeze and musty air.
I gaily cross the chilly floor and
the wood creaks as I descend the stair.
But at the bottom, to my dismay,
There's something gone that should be there.
His red sweater and his spectacles
Lay waiting in his idle chair.

The room holds stacks of favorite books
And journals from our ancestry,
Most of whom I only know
As distant parts of history.
We have a list of lineage,
So I can trace my family tree,
But I learn little of who they were,
And they knew even less of me.

Yet this relative can't be totaled that way,
For a name on a page couldn't sum Uncle Joe.
We knew he was old and we knew he would die,
But I don't know how to let him go...

He loved cheezits and scrabble and wore zippered jackets,
And each night he left his false teeth on the sink
He ate potatoes and mourned his dead sister-
He could sit on the porch all day just to think.
He knew each drop of the river
and would sit for hours to hear its sound,
then fall asleep in his folding chair until his cap fell to the ground.

There are so many things I wish I could know
About my great-great-Uncle Joe.
I mourn that he's gone, but I feel less regret,
To know he's one relative I won't forget.