Bring the bottles of wine from the cellar, reds
and whites forgotten under dust. Bring the
glasses, too, rubbed clean with linen. Bring love.
Bring the olives, slick with salt and oil,
the taste of hot days far away. Bring the
artichokes, asparagus, avocadoes, everything from the beginning
and bring the creamy brie, the creamy blue, the creamy skinned
camembert knowing it will stick on my face.
Bring the beginnings of conversations, bring
the cloth we’ve carried since the first
day of marriage, the gift meant to be spread
on grass, sand, unfurled like a flag. Bring it
because we haven’t used it in years, bring the wrinkled
fiber and the faded roses
and the fraying edges.
Bring these small things, and bring the intent to lie
on this green hill and tell me, again, with water and wine that you will
bring bread, too —
and yams, and zucchini.
And if you can’t bring food,
bring love.
In the days before Thanksgiving, The Tyee is running pieces about food and life excerpted from Sustenance, edited by Rachel Rose, Anvil Press, 2017. Proceeds from sales of the book help support refugee families in B.C. “Picnic” first appeared in Still Hungry, by Alisa Gordaneer, Signature Editions, 2015.
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