Eating in Silence

From my mother’s hands

I take sheets of pasta,

lay them down in a tomato

sauce bed, and we sprinkle

parmesan and asiago on top —

it falls like pollen on a field.

Layer on layer, we laugh

and splatter sauce on our shirts. 

My father climbs the stairs,

says the lasagna looks like dog

meat, but he eats two servings,

fills up his plate as I stack

my grandmother’s china

in my head, mentally sorting

the silence of the table,

wondering if they remember

when grandma taught her the recipe.