Ode to a Log Cabin

During the Great Depression, my grandfather constructed

a miniature log cabin for his young daughter.

He bound pencil-thin dowels he roofed

with heavy tar paper and a red chimney.

Then he secured the cabin to a board,

its painted walkway passing a log pile

while narrowing through grass

to the front door.

The doorway is too small

for even a child’s hand,

so my mother couldn’t use it

as a dollhouse or playhouse.

Instead, she placed it, she said, on a shelf

above her Depression Era dolls and let

its homemade charm speak of her father’s

dedication to making the best of hard times.

And, in truth, its detailed work

embodies, it seems, the shelter

her father made for her

with his untiring love.

I use the present tense because

I have that log cabin.

And the shelter

it still provides.