On My Late Grandmother Still Receiving Mail

And still the letters came.
Her neatly printed name
Was clear on every one.
A few proclaimed she’d won
A one-time cruise or cash,
While others (bright and brash)
Would ask her, “how are you?,”
Not knowing what we knew,
That yesteryear she’d died,
Despite what science tried.

Yet still they came in stacks,
Appearing without tracks.
The bills would bluntly plead
For payment. Others, freed
From envelopes you lick,
Would ask her, “if you’re sick
Of your subscription, might
You try ours,” and we’d fight
The urge to write them, “what
A kind suggestion, but . . .”

We found it moving they
Still thought her, day to day,
Alive and doing well;
That while we’d said farewell,
There were a special few,
Despite their motives, who
Would not concede the fact,
No matter how exact;
Who still took pains to send
A letter to a friend.

—J. P. Celia