A & P

My mother took me to the A & P
Quite often, in the 50s, and back then
That market and the little town were key
To my whole view, as Proust’s lost madeleine

Became for him.  The color of that cake
Was like the dark orange smell of marmalade
From factory sites in Florida that make
That sweetened bitter memory, one made
Of peelings and of low atrocities
That constitute a small town’s petty life.
Rockwell ignored the animosities
And all the penny boredoms that were rife
In this America.  We strolled the store,
And went to church and school—and not much more.

by phillipw | Aug 7, 2018 | A | 0 comments