Grandmother's Stained Glass Window

I dreaded a world without color.
So the day Grandmother died
I removed her cellar door, with its pane
of stained glass, and took with me
the brilliance that lighted her way
to her sacks of potatoes and canned corn.

For years it brightened my house's corners,
neglected as I searched
for an opening in which it could fit.

When we remodeled last I moved it up front
where it leaned visibly through the window,
and passersby saw it,
told of its colors
gleaming out across their path.

So I cut away the door's bottom, pared it down
until all that remained
was a frame filled with pure glass
hung from the ceiling, displayed in my living-room window.

Nights it shines out into the dark.
Mornings it radiates inward,
filling my living room
with Grandmother's reds, yellows and greens.