by Jane McCarthy
mom said
don’t touch the jars in the cellar.
that’s grandma’s apocalypse stash.
that’s war, just in case.
that’s joy in vinegar,
suspended in time.
but i touched the jars.
obviously.
kid fingers craving brine like answers.
i wanted to see
how red the beets could bleed.
how pears look when they’ve been
swallowed by syrup.
how tomatoes die pretty.
grandma boiled
like it was a warning.
her knife: truth.
her silence: policy.
the whole house steamed with cloves
and unfinished childhoods.
she said:
“if you’re not crying from the onions
you’re not doing it right.”
she meant:
slice one red onion into moons.
pack into a clean jar.
boil:
½ cup vinegar,
½ cup water,
1 tablespoon sugar,
½ teaspoon salt.
pour over onions.
seal.
cool.
refrigerate.
wait a day, if you can.
serve with grilled meat,
or grief.
now she’s gone,
and i’m the only one who knows
how to stack the shelves in grief order:
sweet first,
sour last.
i write my dates in wax pencil.
i sing to the peaches before i seal them.
i give the cucumbers names.
(just in case they want to come back!)
i don’t own a gun.
i own a chest freezer.
a dehydrator.
and five kinds of salt.
my apocalypse doesn’t wear camo.
it smells like basil,
and rotting plums i forgot to turn into jam.
when winter comes
and the world runs out of everything,
i’ll open grandma’s last jar of cherries.
i’ll eat them
with my fingers.
and let the syrup run down my wrist
like sweet memories.
photo credit: Loa Kohn, Unsplash
Jane McCarthy recently wrapped five years as a co-founder of a deep-tech company, wrangling ideas, words, and the occasional engineer, in her role leading communications and marketing. Now she’s pursuing ghostwriting gigs, while writing her debut novel. Jane’s short stories and poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Quarter Press, twice in Last Stanza Poetry Journal, twice in Spillwords, The Underland Review’s inaugural issue, The Fairy Tale Magazine, Eye To The Telescope, Jerry Jazz Musician, and three times in Havok. https://janemccarthydna.medium.com