Mom never bought grapes
when I was a kid because of
the boycott, which she explained
to me in great detail
though I was only seven.
Somehow I got it confused with
the picket lines at school
we couldn’t cross and focused
my efforts on getting to Grandma’s
where I could eat all the grapes
I wanted, white or red,
peeling their skins
off with my teeth and stuffing
my mouth so full
drool seeped from
the corners of my lips.
I never understood
the tension that rose
between my mother and hers
over the purchase of grapes,
but the boycott worked
and after the collective
bargaining agreement was signed
my mother found other things
to boycott, like Folger’s coffee,
her mother’s favorite brand.
Lisa Hase-Jackson a holds a Master’s Degree in English from Kansas State University and is pursuing her MFA at Converse College in Spartanburg, South Carolina. Her poems have most recently appeared in such literary magazines as Kansas City Voices and Pilgrimage and anthologized in Lift the Sky. She is the editor of 200 New Mexico Poems.
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