Jelly

Benjamin Nash

July 6, 2025

Figs from the tree by the green

Ford truck, strawberries, 

apples, she put her jelly 

and preserves in mason jars, 

red seal, pears, peaches 

in a basket, her stick for 

snakes, blackberries, sugar, 

the wooden spoon, apples, 

tighten the jars, muscadines,

mayhaws from the river

bottom, white faced cows,

red everywhere else,

watching her pick wild

grapes, it was the laurel

tree blooming, I carried my 

clothes to the dirty 

washroom, the broken dryers,

I thought about my mother,

a bottle of grape soda 

on a long summer day, 

the hot biscuits, my father

getting up early to put

them in the stove before

going to work, suit, the

briefcase, our newspaper

thrown every day to 

the front door, the detergent,

wash, clean, and back to

my apartment, the redbud,

the jelly jars, the colors,

in a row in the food pantry,

the kitchen smells, 

my parents leaving to work

for oil companies in the

Space City, a secretary,

an accountant, my brother,

one more rock song on

the radio after eating

breakfast before the bus comes.

Benjamin Nash’s collection Sun is available at Finishing Line Press. He has had poems published in Louisiana Literature, Concho River Review, Tar River Poetry, 2River, Denver Quarterly, and other publications.