Coming from an Italian family, tomatoes were always a treat. My Nonnie would buy bushels of juicy, ripe tomatoes and make tasty pasta sauce, pizza, and salads. Every Sunday, I would stand on my tiptoes to dip my bread or meatball into the sauce. The hearty, lip-smacking taste always delighted me.
I spent each summer with my Nonnie learning how to enjoy the ordinary routines of life. She taught me how to wash clothes with her old-fashioned wringer washer and dry our wash on a clothesline. When older, I learned the art of making tomato sauce from fresh tomatoes. I added salt, pepper, fresh garlic, and parsley while stirring the squishy mixture. To this day, I love the smell of tomatoes sauce on top of a plate of spaghetti.
I cherish the time I spent with my Nonnie learning how to cook and bake. While there were no dogs in our family or neighborhood, my one precious little cat, Frankie Boy, was my 4-year-old friend until he jumped out of my hands and was hit by a car. It is amazing to me how photo prompts can bring back memories long forgotten?
There is one last memory, the question that I always remember. Is the tomato a fruit or a vegetable? Do you know the answer? Do you remember the Encylopedia Brittanica? It was a favorite research tool in my K-8 elementary school. I always found the best information between the pages. You can find the answer to my probing question here.
- Use the 3 images ("cubed") above as inspiration to write a poem.
- The poem can be any form, any number of lines, rhyming or not.
- The only hitch is that you need to include a reference to all three images in the poem – either via concrete imagery or something more abstract.
Love your response to the challenge, Carol! (especially those "childhood thoughts in a jar") I'll be sure to share this on my blog this month and enter you in the drawing!
ReplyDeleteMatt, thanks for the response to the PoetryCUBED contest. I did not count how long it too me but it was a short amount of time. I really liked this challenge.
DeleteWhat a lovely connection of memories and poetry.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comment, Terje. I love you blue anemones and hope to share it in my Poetrylicious Gallery.
DeleteCarol. Love the memories. Sounds like your Nonnie was a real mentor. I grew up in a Slavic (grandparents) Lithuanian (mother) household so our food consisted of things like halupki, haluski, and bleenies. No one in our family ever made homemade tomato sauce. I am sure it tastes nothing like Ragu or Prego.
ReplyDeleteBob, your information about your past is so interesting and such a different type of food than what I ate. I have tried some Polish food but never heard the titles of the foods you mentioned. It is so much fun learning about different cultures.
DeleteLove the memories, Carol, feels like my childhood, too, that wringer washer we had to watch out for! And your poems fits the pics with style! Matt's challenge is fun!
ReplyDeleteThanks for reading my PoetryCUBED offering, Linda. The wringer washer is such a vibrant image in my head. I really was intrigued by it and wanted to turn the handle. It was a difficult task though.
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