This was her pie—a peck of apples
some walnuts, a pear,
done up with butter-flake dough,
sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.
Juice-smeared blade
set on fresh laundered towel;
bowls, pans, measuring cups
flour coated, the tin slick with butter.
Grooves in the lattice—
second thoughts, realignments,
thoughts vanished with the thinker.
When she died, the recipe died with her,
her last pie, retrieved from the deep freeze
where she stored garden beans,
bunches of kale, this year’s asparagus,
and meats she bought on sale.
A pie for us
to celebrate her life by.
Around the room, I watch mourners’ forks
crush notches where her thumb
pushed the dough between two fingers,
held slightly apart.
