Justin Carter

We Find a Soup Can from 1989 in My Grandmother's Cupboard

It doesn’t matter what brand it was
or if it was really black beans
or if the expiration date was 1992
& the year this happened was earlier
or later or exactly right—if it was
the year that my grandfather died
or the year my aunt moved back home
to stay with her—& it doesn’t matter—
not much—that I was in a different room
& that the can was in the trash
before I even saw it & that my mother
told me about it on the drive home
& it was meant to be a funny aside
about how she’d never cleaned out
that cupboard & how the years
added up on those shelves.

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Justin Carter is a poet/sports writer living in Des Moines, Iowa. His poems appear in The Adroit Journal, Bat City Review, The Journal, Sonora Review, Sycamore Review and other spaces. He holds a PhD in English from the University of North Texas.