This poem was inspired by a drive I took with my mother. It was a beautiful sunny day and Mom said, "Look, Juliet, the sky is the color of Dziadziu's (or grandfather's in Polish) eyes." I smiled and said if I could ever make a Crayola crayon, I would make one called "My Grandfather's Eyes Blue." Dzia, while my relationship with you the last years of your life was very complicated, I love you.

My Grandfather's Eyes Blue

It’s not sky blue. It’s Dziadziu’s eyes blue. My grandfather’s eyes blue.

His eyes were most often a clear blue with a twinkle in them like the sun peaking out from the leaves of a tree. He had a lot in his life to make his eyes twinkle all the time. His father who taught him what it meant to be a honorable Polish man. A beautiful, fiery wife. Three different kids who were all wonderful human beings. Three different granddaughters who charmed him to no end. A house he built with his sweat from the ground up that gave him pride instead of a mortgage from the bank. A community of friends that knew how to make each other laugh and smile. And a God that never seemed to lose faith in him and what he could do.

Sometimes his eyes didn’t have that twinkle, but the color didn’t diminsh. This was during the serene moments in life. Sitting on the porch and enjoying the warm summer breeze with a glass of lemonade. Rocking back and forth in his green armchair while reading the newspaper. Nothing to shout from the rooftops about but little moments that weren’t to be taken for granted.

Then sometimes the clouds would come and his eyes would be overcast with grey. When he was preparing his soul to die at twenty one when it looked like the Japanese were going to win. When he’d come home from a day at the fire department and sit in front of the fireplace to hold his own quiet vigil for those he had not been able to save. For the children who had perished, he held a full silent mass. And then most of all when he began to sink into his age, yearning for the days when he wasn’t frail and could save the immediate world around him.

Those were the skies you saw in his gaze. Bright and sunny, peaceful and lulling, or somber and foggy. They never wavered.

So it’s not sky blue. It’s Dziadziu’s eyes blue. Because his eyes were more picturesque and more beautiful than the sky could ever be. And for sixteen years of my life, what a view it was.