Emerg Infect DisEIDEmerging Infectious Diseases1080-60401080-6059Centers for Disease Control and Prevention3291240AD-120810.3201/eid1208.AD1208Another DimensionAnother DimensionGrandmother Speaks of the Old CountryGrandmother Speaks of the Old CountryHaskinsLolaAddress for correspondence: EID Journal, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Rd NE, Mailstop D61, Atlanta, GA 30333, USA. eideditor@cdc.gov8200612812021202Keywords: GrandmotherLola HaskinsAnother DimensiongermspoetrypoemThat year there were many deaths in the village.Germs flew like angels from one house to the nextand every family gave up its own. Mothersdied at their mending. Children fell at school.Of three hundred twenty, there were eleven left.Then, quietly, the sun set on a day when no onedied. And the angels whispered among themselves.And that evening, as he sat on the stone steps,your grandfather felt a small wind on his neckwhen all the trees were still. And he would tell usalways, how he had felt that night, on the skinof his own neck, the angels, passing.Copyright 2004 by Lola Haskins. Reprinted from Desire Lines: New and Selected Poems, BOA Editions, 2004, by permission of the author and the publisher through American Life in Poetry, an initiative of Ted Kooser, the 2004-2006 poet laureate consultant in poetry to the Library of Congress; the American Life in Poetry project is supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Suggested citation for this article: Grandmother Speaks of the Old Country. Emerg Infect Dis [serial on the Internet]. 2006, Aug [date cited]. http://dx.doi.org/10.3201/eid1208.AD1208