The Purple Cow
I never saw a Purple Cow,
I never hope to see one,
But I can tell you, anyhow,
I’d rather see than be one!
by Gelett Burgess
Other poems of BURGESS (14)
I remember her old hands, and the way she had to slide down the stairs at my parent’s home. My mother kept a special dresser drawer of pictures and things from the past where a few of my grandmother’s poems rested. I wish I asked more questions and paid more attention to stories told about her. I do remember her gaze at me when I was around her as a child. I felt her need to be by me and to hold me. I feel that now too. I like that!!
She reminds me of a character from the 1945 film Mildred Pierce. NO she was not involved in a murder because she was much more inventive and practical and was married to the same man all her life. Her time was the 1930s and 1940s. My grandmother was an epicurean entrepreneur. A genius at what she did. All her wealth she moved into purchasing land in the San Fernando Valley. She owned a farm in the Santa Monica Mountains too. She invested in her four children’s’ future. Helping them all to reach for their dreams. By the time I came around most of her financial wealth and creative spark was gone due to the usual metamorphose of change, age and a new generation.
I awoke this morning thinking about my grandmother on my paternal side. She was quite the gal. She drove all the way out from Pittsburgh Pennsylvanian, with her family, and invested in the Santa Monica Pier. She had food-stands on or near the pier where she sold different items such as pineapple and cold water taffy. I heard a story once sharing that she got her hand caught in a taffy stretching machine.
She eventually owned and managed The Purple Cow a popular restaurant on the Santa Monica pier.
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