On cold evenings 
my grandmother, 
with ownership of half her mind — 
the other half having flown back to Bohemia —

spread newspapers over the porch floor 
so, she said, the garden ants could crawl beneath,  
as under a blanket, and keep warm,

and what shall I wish for, for myself, 
but, being so struck by the lightning of years, 
 to be like her with what is left, that loving.

 = Susannah Wood