SAVE YOUR FORK, THERE’S PIE

Remember those dinners when we were young

With enormous turkeys raised on prehistoric farms

And the plates overflowed, wheelbarrow high

With fine chopped carrots or potatoes carved

Into moon rocks, unique and precious.

Lakes of gravy spilling over, flooding

The landscapes of platters, bountiful culinary

Backdrops which hid the poverty of the diners.

We ate in our Sunday best, worn and dusty from

Squirming on wooden pews and running through

The gravel parking lot in-between the parishioners’

Cars as they raced away from their weekly blessing.

The table always housed more than the family.

Strangers to us, but known through their need

By my parents who worshiped charity over privacy.

Sometimes they were friends who could share

A joke or tell stories as worn as the lace napkins.

Hand-me downs like the values my father

Impressed on us through the epistles of ritual.

How we ravaged our way by spoonfuls until

Only the remains for soup were left.

Always the perennial questions were asked.

Were there enough potatoes, or I hope the turkey

Wasn’t dry, even though each slice swam

Its way to safety through the thick brown lake.

If the counting of blessings equaled the cost

I would not care, because my mother’s heed

Cast aside such crude economics.

Save your fork, there’s pie.

Apple pie, lemon meringue pie, charity pie.

A slice for each. Nobody leaves hungry.

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