Conserve With Grandma

Our afternoons of jam
started with a twist of the red lid
and a spoon thrust in
like an arctic flag.

You had too much
skin; it hung from you
in bags while we took turns
scooping sweet, jellied lumps
into scone halves.

When you had a point
to make or caught
me halfway through
articulating
some deeply-held conviction,
to injerject you'd grip
the buried spoon
between thumb and forefinger tip
and guide it
like a joystick
while you steered me
through the jagged reefs
of your half-submerged beliefs.

Often you'd tut
if I snowballed cream
down the front of my blouse
but I kept schtum
when jam dripped
from your seed-husk dry lips,
when blotches led
from the jar
across the tablecloth to your saucer,
like bloodstains in the snow.