Being a Grandparent

Explaining grandkids to your friends

Who have none is, I find,

Like trying to describe chartreuse

To someone who is blind.

 

For your grandkids bring out feelings

That nobody else can match,

Laying bare an itch you never knew

You had, but now can scratch.

 

As a parent, you experience

The fiercest love and pride

Intertwined with the anxiety

That childhood does provide.

 

Though when one becomes a nana

(Or whatever term you pick),

All you’ve learned plus new beginnings

Come together with a click.

 

There’s a closeness through your child

But a paramount remove,

So you have a chance to bond and kvell*

With nothing left to prove.

 

Yet before I had my grandkids,

I would surely have dismissed

Ever needing them, but now I know

The joy I would have missed.

 

*to beam with pride and joy