The Estate Sale

Elizabeth N. Flores

July 6, 2025

The estate sale carried over into a second day.

Trays of chicken salad and pimento cheese sandwiches, 

tortilla chips, pumpkin empanadas, 

coffee and fruit punch adorned 

the dining room table for the “guests,” 

as Mama Consuelo called them. 

At ninety, she was long past preparing 

all the refreshments herself. 

But she could instruct her children 

which party trays to order from H-E-B, 

insisting on those with the “gourmet” label. 

At first, Mama Consuelo’s sons and daughters 

griped in whispers at the spectacle 

of strangers lining up, at their mother’s direction,

from the patio door to the table. 

“This is not a merienda.”

“What’s next, lotería?”

But as Mama Consuelo’s children watched 

her welcome the “guests,”

and saw the care with which 

she made sure all were fed, whether or not 

they bought furniture and other useful 

but no longer wanted items,

their irritation lifted. 

This was Mama Consuelo, 

her truest, most giving self 

on full display,

her rich warmth filling 

her soon-to-be vacated house.

Elizabeth N. Flores, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, taught for over 40 years at Del Mar College and was the college’s first Mexican American Studies Program Coordinator. Her recent poems can be found in the TPA Quarterly, the Windward Review, the Texas Poetry Assignment, The Senior Class: 100 Poets on Aging, edited by Laurence Musgrove, and ¡Somos Tejanas!: Chicana Identity and Culture in Texas, edited by Jody A. Marín and Norma E. Cantú.