Grandma returned
as a newspaper publisher
like Ethel Barrymore
in Deadline USA
She’d seen it all
elegant and battle-hardened
each deadline a Tiffany scar

I was her editor
her Humphrey Bogart
We sat in the newsroom
talking coverage
for the next edition
though I can’t recall
what made page one 

Then I woke up
our partnership dissolved
the newsroom darkened
the presses relics
a-holes with X accounts
fancying themselves
“independent journalists”

The real Grandma
didn’t write and would
never pick a printed fight
She probably watched
Studio Wrestling
more than she read
The Daily News

It was just a dream
thin like smoke
from a candle snuffed
a board game
with missing pieces
But in a wisp of time
I had a boss I loved