Family Poems

Winter kitchen
by Jenny Dunbar

Quince, the golden peach
its essence blooming from glass jars, just sealed,
aromatic, warm,
raw November banished,
retreating through opaque windows,
I close my eyes, taste the air, redolent of the hours,
those carriers of narrative, each facet a glimpse of time remembered,
an affirmation of then and now,

a particle held captive in its amber pool,
the essential blemish,
that grounding mark, reminding me that perfection distracts,
there is always another layer,
a lifting of the lid,
promise of process between seed and harvest,
touching earth,
this year has gifted the maker with bounty,
as if the sands of time ran too fast
we husbanded with acknowledgement and skill,
intuiting the all too precious moments,
lost and found,
as we passed through together
in remembrance of warmth in the soul

Berry Picking

by Marne Wilson

You and I went looking last summer for raspberries
and, finding none, were forced to admit
that we have no idea what the bushes look like.
I don’t know your excuse,
but I never needed to look for raspberries before.
I always had them pressed upon me.

Uncle Eilert dropped them every summer afternoon
into his plastic ice cream pail,
not stopping until it was full to the brim.
All except the top layer would be crushed.
My mother said they were perfect
for spooning on angel food cake,
but I wished for perfect raspberries,
ones that hadn’t been ruined by the weight of ambition.

Although today is cold and blustery,
I have beside me some raspberries from Mexico,
whole and complete in their gleaming plastic box,
for they traveled that distance in one single layer.
I want to say their perfection makes them better,
but in fact they fail to engage my attention.
No matter how much I chew them,
they refuse to taste like raspberries should.

It was the pressure, I finally realize,
that released all the flavor of my uncle’s berries.
Too much perfection is beautiful
but may not be worth biting into.
It is the messy things that are full of life and flavor.

Marne Wilson lives in Parkersburg, West Virginia.  She is the author of two chapbooks: The Bovine Daycare Center (Finishing Line, 2015) and As Lovers Always Do (forthcoming from Etchings Press).

The House in Leitrim

by DS Maolalai

the wet clay
peeled
with sucking sounds
straight
from the spade. I was eight.
my father dug,
wanting to show
that he could bend the world
to city hands. the house
had been
a long time
unoccupied
before we took it; trees grew in the kitchen
and the plaster walls would crumble
to even my
weak touch.

they’d got it cheap,
my parents,
and intended
eventually
that it would be broken
like a dog
and forced to piss
outside. there were spiders
living in every corner
and a long war
was waged against the mice
and the rabbits on the hill.
as a fire escape
heavy stones
were placed on each windowsill
and the paint was done
to keep the damp out of the woodwork
and seal the place
for visitors.

but bad Irish weather
fell down
and crushed minds
like the top of a the mountain behind us.
it engulfed the place
like frogspawn
clumping on rocks.
pride lost;
I don’t know
the last time
anyone
has bothered to visit.

DS Maolalai has been nominated for Best of the Web and twice for the Pushcart Prize. His first collection, “Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden”, was published in 2016 by the Encircle Press, with “Sad Havoc Among the Birds” forthcoming from Turas Press in 2019.

Trains

by George Moore

I do not remember locomotives by name.
I see the trains in the Newark terminal

commuters hurrying to board and disappear
into steam clouds and a world beyond my view.

The blowdown and oil smelled of iron scorched
in fires fed by gray men in filthy overalls.

When my father left one days and never returned
the trains continued to carry me outward

by common rails by grease sweat and exhaust
across borders and seas to find myself alone.

The cars ratcheting a beat on the rail seams
sleeping to the rhythm in my mother’s lap.

Conscious of the steady stream of time
sweeping us up and back to the age of steam.

George Moore’s collections include Saint Agnes Outside the Walls (FurureCycle 2016) andChildren’s Drawings of the Universe (Salmon Poetry 2015). Poems have appeared in The Atlantic, Poetry, Arc, North American Review, Stand, Orion, and The Colorado Review.  His work was recently shortlisted for the Bailieborough Poetry Prize and long-listed for the Gregory O’Donoghue Poetry Prize.