AOC
By Ceinwen E Cariad Haydon
My last plate shatters
(blue, artisan stoneware, one of six).
One by one I smashed them.
Lonely, bleached Breton lanes, poplar-lined
led me to your stall, canopied against the sun.
My purchase, an act of rebellion
fuelled by Muscadet,
appellation d’origine contrôlée.
Temptation swerved me off-course.
I had to have your wares
when francs in my pocket were low
and my man cursed female intemperance.
Back in Birmingham, he proved temporary –
but eating, I always remembered you.
Your speckled glaze perfected meals
over decades of feasting, love and loss.
Today, I watch the latest one
to share my bed. Mindful, his brush
sweeps up my last pretty plate. The final
pieces fallen
ruined, on quarried tiles, my kitchen’s floor.
Fragments shattered,
so many happy accidents from years before.
Note:
AOC - French - appellation d’origine contrôlée - the French certification granted to certain French geographical indications for wines, cheeses, butters and other agricultural products
Ceinwen E Cariad Haydon lives near Newcastle upon Tyne, UK and writes short stories and poetry. She is widely published in online magazines and in print anthologies. Her first chapbook was published in July 2019: Cerddi Bach [Little Poems], Hedgehog Press. Her first pamphlet is due to be published in 2021. She is a Pushcart Prize and Forward Prize nominee (2019) and has an MA in Creative Writing from Newcastle University, UK (2017).