Rosalie

[YRKB]

From your...
Delicate, finely made -
Pecan hued, frame;
The golden-Hazel gaze that scolds, sulks,
simpers, shies or shines
from within it's Almond shaped setting...
To, I suppose now, even your
name -
'Rosalie',
The frame in which your face will forever be set in...
You have always seemed, to me...
Well,
Ornamental - as much as,
Experiential...
Rosalie, Amah -
my mother's mother -
The jewel in your daughter's crown,
And, as such, my heirloom -
Passed down.
Even in times you indulged -
your quiet, epic anger;
like thunder-clouds, cinching skies over Vieux Fort,
wherein stands the Island home you bought -
perhaps, Rosalie,
you thought -
you were ordinary all along...

My God, you were wrong!

But as yet, my grandmother -
in all 21 years that you have been mine,
in all this time,
Rosalie Rodway...
descriptions evade you,
in any definitive way.

Your elder sister told us all -
you navigated the house's drain-pipes
in your petticoat,
at night;
to dance 'The Twist';
'My God! My God!'
She said -
How she did it!
And I looked then at your lowered face,
the certain smile,
to see -
that Rosalie!
Early sixties -
South American beauty,
string band in the back -
hair clasped high, and on the attack!

Copyright Yafeu-Khamisi Rodway-Brown

[Jett Black]

You have a way with words YRKB, but this work is so introspective that it is difficult for an outsider aka reader to actually grasp what you are writing about.

This: Your elder sister told us all -
you navigated the house's drain-pipes
in your petticoat,
at night;
to dance 'The Twist';

Is like Rosalie sneaking out at night to go to a club to dance? If so I can understand, dig it. But your average reader? Not sure man.

[AuntShecky]

The sentiment is unassailable, the portrait of Rosalie is vivid, and the sounds of some of the lines (alliteration) are pleasant to hear in the mind's ear.

What needs work is the inconsistent capitalization and punctuation. For instance, you don't need so many dashes. Look up the purpose of the ellipsis (. . .) That punctuation mark is used only to indicate something has been left out, such as part of a direct quote; it's not meant to be used to indicate a pause or to substitute for a colon.

If you are so inclined, check out this punctuation guide (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?56601-Auntie-s-Down-and-Dirty-Punctuation-Guide).

"It's Almond shaped setting"--no need to capitalize "almond." Here you DO need a hyphen, as "almond-shaped" is a hyphenated word. More importantly, it's the wrong "its."
"Its" (no apostrophe") shows possession, as "This table lacks its leg."
"It's" (with apostrophe) Contraction for "It is." "It's raining today."

In free verse, knowing where to break the line is important (as opposed to metered verse in which the line ends when the required number of feet and stresses are met.) In your work above, the line breaks seem arbitrary. Try to combine some of the lines and "break" them when it seems natural to do so, such as whenever you want to emphasize a certain word.