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Unread 12-24-2017, 05:31 AM
John Isbell John Isbell is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2017
Location: TX
Posts: 6,630
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Grape Jelly

Heading to Lisa’s, we stopped at Trader Joe’s,
where the black ice had melted in the rain,
to purchase drink. We reached her house about
a car ride later, and took off our shoes
to greet the host - who said three sentences
or so to us in total. Our young men
moved among Lisa’s neighbors, as I sat
with Matt to speak of this and that. He asked
about our stay in Strasbourg, and I told
how Rita taught French as I crossed the Rhine
to teach my students German. There’s no need
to show a passport these days, if you’re not
en route to Hungary. This year, we plan
to take them to Vienna, and if not,
I said to Matt, we’ll head to Prague and Cracow,
which people say are lovely
. Like a small
stone in a pond, Matt dropped into our chat
that thirty miles from Cracow, there is Auschwitz,
for those who care to visit. And the gears
of conversation shifted, as we talked
of what is right and what is not, of how
one teaches German, of the film Dunkirk,
of Wolf Hall, which I could not read – on page
eight or nine, the father kicks his prone
son in the head, and I put down the book.
We ate baked brie, and ham, and greeted Amy,
who’d put grape jelly on her meatballs. Matt
confided that in me – her mother’s secret.
When I met Amy, I was five or so,
there’s weight to our acquaintance. Did you put
grape jelly on your meatballs?
I inquired.

24.xii.2017

Last edited by John Isbell; 12-24-2017 at 03:42 PM.
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