Today at dVerse Poetics, I get to be the bartender and give the prompt. The prompt for today is food. And y’all know how I love food! And if you want the recipe for this, here is the link: http://kanzensakura.com/2013/06/18/papas-peach-cobbler
Papa’s Peach Cobbler
When I feel the need to go to a safe place,
A happy place,
A time when things were simple –
I close my eyes and when I open them
I’m six again.
Papa is teaching me to make his peach cobbler.
Fresh peaches – juicy drippy happy peaches –
Peeled and sliced into quarter moons –
Dropped into a bowl and sprinkled with sugar and spices.
He gives the slices a stir
And puts into the pan
With all the other good stuff
(this time he let me put in the flour!)
Into the oven….
Soon the smells of sweet crust
And cinnamon and peaches
Fills the air.
Torture. Sitting through dinner
Pretending to eat so
I can use my stomach area for cobbler….
Papa’s peach cobbler.
Safety, love, family.
A bowl filled with hot peachy love
Topped with thick country cream
Or vanilla ice cream
Or just….plain it cannot be called plain.
I stand by the table and pretend I am six again
and as he taught me, make the cobbler.
I wonder if the tears that fall into the cobbler
Change the flavor…
kanzen sakura 
Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:17:30
I think those tears only sweeten the memories attached to it. After all this is not about peach cobbler, but it is. I remember canning most about my mother, and separating and weighting beef actually. We used to buy it in large qualitites and separate it down to 1 pound packs.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:24:04
And you are right, it is about peach cobbler and it isn’t. My mother said, when I made the cobbler about two years after he died, that she could close her eyes and see him…
Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:23:53
Oh I love this. When I close my eyes and open them again, I’m six… terrific! Stopped by to say hi and give you a special cyber hug. It’s been a while. Hope all’s well with you. ❤
Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:25:56
Hi Paulette! it is sooooo good to see you! I hope all of you are well and happy. thank you for saying hi. i’m fine but mourning my friend Peggie – Huntmode.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:33:03
I understand about Peggy. I’m still not over losing Bill. He used to phone me every week and we’d talk for a long time. I looked forward to those fun conversations. Some of us have connected and moved into sustaining friendships here in cyberville. It’s really quite lovely. I’m always happy to see your posts even though I don’t comment much. I’m with you.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 18:45:53
I miss Bill as well. Peggy and I talked weekly. Bill’s passing coming so close to her brother’s passing really affected her. I feel like a light has left the world.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 19:03:59
It has indeed. She was a wonderful woman. Be well my friend.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 19:05:05
Thank you. And you as well.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 20:13:49
And you.
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Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:26:54
Nice warm memories of your childhood and father ~ I associate certain food with my growing up years – for me it would be ice cream and rice-sugar cakes ~ Thanks for the lovely prompt again ~
Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:29:43
The rice-sugar cakes and ice cream sound delicious. I am making avocado ice cream this weekend, recipe given to me by a Philippine co-worker. I’ve made before and it is swoon worthy. he said it was a food he always ate and went back to his childhood with. We all have that time machine food.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 17:54:07
This stirs both the heart and the appetite. Lovely as always.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 18:43:26
Thank you.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 19:42:15
Welcome.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 18:10:25
Lovely & loving poem. Those childhood memories can be so very deep. I can understand why you would have such a strong memory of peach cobbler. I have a deep memory of my mother’s rhubarb torte. No one could make this torte like my mother…. Sometimes she would get up very early in the morning and make one before I even woke up; and I would have WARM rhubarb torte for breakfast. Yum… I think peach cobbler evokes the same kind of feeling. I definitely understand you saving room for peach cobbler and ice cream.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 18:43:08
How precious she would do that before breakfast! Our childhood food stays with us for good or for ill.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 18:48:51
I wonder if the tears that fall into the cobbler
Change the flavor…
The food prepared by our loved ones hold such deep emotions for us all.. something which is long remembered..loved the closing lines.. beautiful & poignant 🙂
Jun 16, 2015 @ 18:55:10
Thank you. He was a dear sweet man. My mother says the cobbler I fix according to his method taste just like his.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 20:57:24
As a little salt adds flavor to anything, tears add the love, with just enough salt to be the most delicious cobbler since your daddy made it. ❤ ❤ ❤
You n.e.e.d. a love button so I can click it any time I want. 😀
Jun 16, 2015 @ 21:14:19
You are so precious. ♡♡♡
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Jun 17, 2015 @ 07:50:58
❤ ~{~_*}~~
Jun 16, 2015 @ 21:52:42
Oh what lucious memories!
Jun 16, 2015 @ 23:13:42
my mom would can peaches when they were ripe – soft and tender, 100 times better than what you can buy in a store. Peaches are full of memories…
Jun 16, 2015 @ 23:30:00
Yes they are. I can my own peaches, freeze them and make a peach lime jam from them. Oh yeah and cobblers! Eating peaches fresh off the tree cannot be beaten. So many foods bring back memories from our childhood.
Jun 16, 2015 @ 23:32:19
We had a big pear tree in the yard, there would be so many pears that the branches would bend and groan under the weight. Picking a pear that is warmed by the sun… yumm
Jun 16, 2015 @ 23:42:05
Oh yeah. We had one like that. Canned pears and pear preserves. Good stuff. They kept well too. And brandied pears….
Jun 16, 2015 @ 23:56:39
such a beautiful memory – i so understand that some food is unbreakably connected with the person who taught us to make it or that we had it with the first time
Jun 17, 2015 @ 00:30:26
It seems to be a common thread among us…
Jun 17, 2015 @ 00:43:02
What a wonderful memory you spice your peach cobbler with. I think food can have memories attached with them. We never had a lot of good food at home… So there are very few such memories.
Jun 17, 2015 @ 07:05:52
We had little money but we had a huge garden and relatives in the country so we had access to that. Orchards of peaches and apples, fields of wild berries, and we also had our own fruit trees. We froze and canned fruits and vveggies for use during the winter. I was blessed to grow up in a home of good cooks. There was a kid who lived a few houses down who usually managed to be around for a few meals a week. His parents were good people but oriented to business and the father taught in a local school. They lived off hamburger and potatoes because they didn’t care. Food was just fuel, not a pleasure.. not hard people but….not imaginative. We were open people. All were welcome and there was always enough. Not rich food, but well made and enjoyable. He was a lonely kid. I think he enjoyed the conversation as much as the food. He did well and had a good life. Opened a local bookstore with coffee and light food. My grandmother taught him to make biscuits and doughnuts.
Jun 17, 2015 @ 09:42:53
This powerful feeling of connection to a family member through food (I have such a fond memory of learning how to make eclairs with a beloved aunt) is so warmly and lovingly described. What a wonderful memory and recipe to treasure! It reminds me in intent to the poem by Seamus Heaney about peeling potatoes with his mother – it always makes me weep when I read it.
When all the others were away at Mass
I was all hers as we peeled potatoes.
and so on to the last lines:
I remembered her head bent towards my head,
Her breath in mine, our fluent dipping knives–
Never closer the whole rest of our lives.
Jun 17, 2015 @ 11:06:17
Ah for me to be 5 again.. as school takes away the peachy life of freshly made
churning cream.. of river front life.. chairs of old.. flaking paint.. breeze flowing
cool humid and steamy hot.. over river dreams.. love is in the air.. in
arms of churning ones.. a peach of life.. is a cobbler road.. of yellow
brick one for me in Oz.. and yes.. finally..i freely go back..
whenever i love.. a place called home..:)
Jun 17, 2015 @ 19:14:04
luscious work, my friend–both verbal and gustatory! may the delicious memories wrap you in their arms and soothe, soothe. xoxo
Jun 18, 2015 @ 02:14:46
Loved this poem….absolutely…!!!
Jun 18, 2015 @ 11:45:11
I’m glad you do!