Dust & Paper

Opened the cupboard, way in back,

a stack of cookbooks, cracked

spines, grease-stained pages.

Not the sharp lemon of clean,

or the fresh-cut grass of spring.

This was a deeper thing.

A breath, thick with cardamom,

vanilla that had lost its edge,

just a memory, hanging.

And something else, underneath,

the fine, dry grit of dust motes,

paper turning fragile brown.

My grandmother's hand, maybe,

still caught in that slow release.

It was the scent of careful use,

of something loved and then left.

A history. Not sad, exactly.

Just dense. Like a stone.