Back of the Fridge

I found it at the back of the fridge,

the plastic container I'd forgotten

three weeks ago, maybe four.

The lid was warped, condensation

beading on the inside like sweat.

The rice inside had turned

a color I couldn't name—

not quite brown, not quite gray,

something in between that suggested

transformation, evolution, bacteria

doing its invisible work.

I couldn't throw it away.

Not yet. I held the container

up to the light and watched

the particles suspended in liquid,

watched small civilizations

multiplying in the dark,

and thought about my grandmother,

how she'd make kimchi

in jars that burped on the counter,

how she'd say the smell was proof

of life, of becoming something

other than what it started as.

This wasn't kimchi. This was

accident, negligence, time

doing what it does when we're

not looking. But something

in me recognized the logic—

the closed system, the pressure

building, the necessary decay

that precedes flavor, or poison,

or both.

I put it back in the fridge.