REESE’S CUPS AND SWEET TARTS. By Chani Zwibel

The taste of Reese’s peanut butter cups

brings me back to my grandparents’ kitchen as a child;

these treats could always be found

in the bottom drawer of the bread cupboard.

I would gleefully eat multiples

of the chocolate peanut butter goodness

while watching cartoons

in the living room with Grandma.

She never minded if I wanted to watch something.

She would share her TV with me,

unless Judge Judy

or Antique’s Road Show

or Law and Order was on.

She loved Anne of Green Gables

and PBS specials.

I remember watching countless Supermarket Sweep

While eating Sweet Tarts,

another candy always kept at hand.

She drank Pepsi

and smoked cigarettes.

Pepsi was all she would drink,

even on her death bed.

The walls of that old farm house fill with ghosts

of every yesteryear

in a rising tide of emotion.

After she died,

being in the house with her gone seemed so wrong,

and yet, there she was

in every room and in the yard,

summoned by the taste of sweet candies.

I could crack open my heart and let it run,

gore and gristle,

to my toes in the dirt,

to water the earth,

a strange Pepsi poured out, a libation.

It would not be enough.

 

Pain would spread out

like geese taking flight

and fall with the feathers into the pond

sending ripples across

that tickle the nose of the goldfish.

All the dreams you were saving

for a Fall day are coming here soon.

All the dreams you remembered

are building to bring this boon:

a quiet hill,

and a quiet view,

a light breeze above the cemetery,

an old town down in the hollow.

 Chani Zwibel is a graduate of Agnes Scott College, was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but now dwells in Marietta, Georgia, with her husband and their dog. She is an associate editor with Madness Muse Press. She enjoys writing poetry after nature walks and daydreaming.