Flash Fire

That red petticoat
Flashed from under grandma’s skirt
Like the flicker of a cardinal’s wing,
Against white snow in a winter wood.

That red petticoat,
Six yards of scarlet taffeta,
Scalloped ‘round the hem
With white lace and satin bows,
Put a strut in grandma’s walk
That made her silver curls
Bounce and giggle on her head.

Grandma said red is the devil’s color,
And it was the devil made her buy it
When she spied it on the rack
Among the weary whites and pale pastels.
Grandma said it caught her eye
Like a bullfighter’s cape,
And she charged that rack,
Head down and nostrils flaring,
Grabbed that petticoat
And turned her back forever
On baby blue and powder pink,
Those soft-hued shades old ladies wear
To match their tinted hair.

Grandma said when she wore
That red petticoat
She thought of gypsy girls
With the rosy flush of campfires
Creeping over their copper-colored skin,
Or, can-can dancers high-kicking
Across a stage in starched crinolines.

That red petticoat,
Some might say,
Was as out of place on grandma
As a blush on a burlesque dancer.
But when grandma wore
That red petticoat,
She shot off sparks like a firecracker,
And we leaped around her
Like little tongues of flame
At the edge of a flash fire.

Copyright Susan Matthewson 2010