Paprika
by Alan Bern
At the very back of our ancient Frigidaire is a little bag made of white cotton; the red letters on it spell Paprika. Sweet, we remember. I rarely see the bag—for fifteen years it’s sat there following our Budapest trip.
Annie, your brain’s half-gone now, but, before your decline, with your thin eyebrows raised, you explained to us that, from our description, you believed we’d purchased our Paprika in a store right next to the pastry shop Lukács in the odd-shaped square where the Germans had taken off your favorite aunt and your loud mother’s mother.
Yes, it’s difficult to remember all these things, and we must assume the Paprika’s now stale. Perhaps, too, it’s gone bad with bugs.
Also published at Haunted Water Press