Corrections to an Obituary

She's gone, he tells me.

The woman for years at death's door has succumbed,

and despite my name following lies in her obituary,

the news is not grief but freedom.

- - -

Consider this a correction:

I did not affectionately call that woman anything,

and she did not embody what a grandma should be;

she wouldn't even let us use that word.

- - -

My memories are a highlight reel of her worst moments,

every bad memory I can so vividly recall.

These are all I have of her

a bony finger pinching at the slightest bit of belly fat on my pre-pubescent sister

complaints on scrap paper, tucked carelessly into a thinking of you card three weeks after my unacknowledged birthday — I never gave her that address

broken promises, verbal attacks on my mother, weaponized phone calls or lack thereof after catching onto her patterns

a final night six years ago, a ruined Christmas Eve, a reminder of her commitment to holding a grudge

maybe that's the one thing I got from her, that ever-lasting ability to hold a fucking grudge,

but at least with me, it's honest

I am not hiding behind bitterness whispered in a hug, fake stories, or half-baked Catholicism for the sake of appearances.

- - -

How much can family mean to the woman who left my mother out of it?

Even in death, the petty woman finds ways to exclude her,

a missing name on the obituary survivors list, not there with my dad's.

If spirits are real, I hope hers comes to regret all of it,

to feel my absence at her funeral, my lack of mourning after years of absence from her life,

and finally see the grave she dug herself long before reaching this one.

If nothing else, may she regret not removing my name as well.