Echoes of Summer

Once, in the waning dusk of an August too bountiful,
we were undone by the yield–
and embarrassing glut of tomatoes–
heavy, bursting, red as ruin.

They came in droves,
tumbled over baskets like a prophecy,
and we– heedless fools–
preserved them.

We scaled them clean,
peeled their delicate skin
as one might strip secrets from a confidante.

We boiled them in their own memory,
seasoned them with salt and something like regret,
and sealed them in glass tombs–
a pantry of ghosts.

For we knew– oh, didn't we–
that winter would come.
Not just in weather, but in soul.
The pale season. The lean months.

When the tongue forgets sweetness.
When the warmth feels like a myth
someone once whispered
in a different life.

So we kept summer.
We jarred joy.
We placed it on dark shelves
as proof that excess once nearly killed us
with pleasure.

And one day, when everything is cold and mean–
we will open one.
And remember
how it felt to be too full.
And how even rapture
must rot
if not respected.