A poem!

In effort to post more I thought I'd put up some of the other writing I've been doing lately. This is a poem I wrote for a Third Thursday, a monthly Wild Goose Creative Event . This was read as people ate freshly baked apple pie.

Grandma’s pies

My grandma
never baked pies.
Not that I can remember

She made egg strata
ocean sized dishes
with tiny sausages buoys.

She made almond kissed Christmas cookies.
Santa Claus cut outs laced with addictive sprinkles.

She made clam chowder
served in metal bowls
and potato casserole
one half thick with onions
the other with out
a thin tooth pick dividing
like the mason Dixon line’s
casserole cousin
joking uncles would shuffle the pick
and watch culinary Gettysburgs ensue

And jam
She made jam.
Oh she made jam!
Cold jam in foil covered freezer jars.
The size and shape of bazooka shells
pressed into our eager hands before we went home.
Ready to detonate.
Pectin sweet
fruity treat.
tasting like heat
like summer
like being “this” many.

My grandma was the president of jam.
Elected by the people for the people
to a lifetime of jammy terms.
Her inaugural addresses spread over toast
on biscuits
her state of the union spooned in directly
into waiting mouths.

But no pies. At least none that I can remember.