My grandma is just another old woman
or so I thought until I interviewed her
for a poem about grandparents
to fulfill another challenge’s
challenge.

She shares tales of cleaning houses since she 14,
there were no child labor laws
back then.
She cleaned 128 separate houses
in her lifetime.
Now she’s back down to just original
house and owner.

She maintained her
first job for nearly 7 decades.
Same employer has seen her
through marriage, birth, death,
but never her own graduation,
as she quit school in 11th grade
after her father died to contribute
to her family’s bottom line.

But her own three children
all marched across a stage
to Pump and Circumstance
to collect that precious parchment.