Grandma's Yardstick

GRANDMA'S YARDSTICK

My grandmother kept a yardstick over her kitchen door

it was thick and wide and three feet long and it came from the hardware store.

The stick would stay up over the door as long as we were good.

But we were threatened with the sting of the stick if we didn't behave as we should.

Sometimes Grandma would give us a choice that seemed extremely hard,

of the stick she kept over the kitchen door or a switch from a tree in the yard.

She really never used the stick as far as I can recall

To actually use it on one of us would never enter her mind at all.

The stick now lives at my brother's house up over his kitchen door

I'm sure he's used it to make some threats as grandmother did before.

But now it brings fond memories as Grandma looks down from above,

of the feelings she had for each of us and her deep and unending love.

R. Bruss

2016