The Kindly Meal Poem by Crystal Korzinsky Chambers

The Kindly Meal


His small wooden table
on the screened in porch.
With two wooden chairs
Painted green;
Set opposite each other.
The bowls ready for us
with their warm contents
filling the air of tomato
and pasta.

Calmly, his mother’s
faceless voice calls us
from the swings,
to dine on ravioli.
To them a regular thing;
to me a regal meal.
Lucky him, living
in the same house for years.
The steps warmed
by his ancient cat.
Mother, mine, married poor;
the wretch gave us children tears
and years of moving here
and there; and lunches
from bologna, Olive loaf,
catsup and cheese.

Their shaded porch cool from
the thick covr'ing trees-
we sit, dining like royalty
in the summer between
K and First; lessons of life
already long began
Before friends sharing ravioli.