Grandma’s Bean Pot

 

 

I find it the cellar next to the owl 

candle in a carton, hidden behind

dish shards and a stool 

 

one day … really. The pot’s dust-coated.

Brown and beige surface unscarred despite

toting from town to city, city to country,

 

country to country. Saturday night servant.

It has heard discussions about Roosevelt,

Ike, McCarthy and Kennedy before

 

being shunted aside, doomed to wander

the world. Ignored, unloved. I sort hard,

brown beans like Grandma once did. She

 

looked out at two maple trees, my swing and

The clothesline with white sheets flapping

In the fall wind. I see a château and

 

trees with yellow leaves, not like their

New England scarlet cousins. Beans

soak in my silvery bowl

 

swelling as I go in search of salt pork.

My butcher offers bacon. It will

have to do. I add molasses, onion,

 

mustard, water. Grandma tells me

how in spindly writing on a

yellowed file card. Saucisson

 

replaces hot dogs. The cole slaw

tastes the same, carrying me back

across the sea to childhood Saturdays.