After all these years

He stares at the open refrigerator.

Shelves, mostly empty, except

for a block of cheddar, three eggs,

lettuce that’s seen better days,

milk three days past expiration,

leftover Chinese takeout from 

maybe two weeks ago, and 

a tomato collapsing upon itself. 

He’s got two hours before 

the couple from church arrives,

the ones who’ve fed him dinner

three times and now they’re 

stopping by, thank God not

for dinner.

He stares at the supermarket,

shelves stuffed with every thing

of every kind, aisle displays

fighting the shopping cart, 

special promotions in dairy,

buy-one-get-one-free corn flakes,

all these faux oases found while

wandering in the desert

of overabundance.

After all these years of

prison, no one trained him

in the art of munchies and dips,

sweet and savory, what crackers

might be appropriate with edam or 

brie, don’t forget cocktail napkins

and toothpicks and plastic utensils

and worse, still, how to make

small talk over bridge nuts and mints.

No one told him that the food

might be less important than

himself, that maybe they might

just want to talk 

after all these years.

The editors of Tweetspeak Poetry are hosting a 30-Day, 30-Poem Challenge for Earth Month entitled, appropriately enough, Poetic Earth Month. Today, the featured poem is “Awaiting Arrival” by Ann Doe Overstreet, and the poetry prompt is to write a poem describing the foods you, a friend, or a relative keep on hand in case of someone’s arrival. I used a fictitious character from a story I’ve been working on for a long time.

Photograph by Jordan Madrid via Unsplash. Used with permission.