PRESERVATION

The ashes of my parents I vacuum-packed
in old glass canning jars, part

of my life, but not my life. The green
plastic box holds the return trip to Italy.

A crate hammered from pine for poems
I never finished, attic racks for paintings

my children may someday discard at the curb.
The photograph of my husband 

in my jewelry box,
beside the brooch he gave me, 

cradled in sorrow soft as shadows.
And when I die, I’ll leave my mistakes

sealed tight in zip-lock bags,
all wrapped in cotton wool and lies. 

Ruth Bavetta’s poems have appeared in North American Review, Nimrod, Rattle, Slant, Atlanta Review, Tar River Poetry and many other journals and anthologies. Her published books are Fugitive Pigments, What’s Left Over, Embers on the Stairs, Selected Poems, and Flour, Water, Salt. She likes the light on November afternoons, the music of Stravinsky, the smell of the ocean. She hates pretense, prejudice, and sauerkraut.