​POETRY  -
  with a focus on food 
Rooftop Garden, Transbay Terminal  -  Photo by Author   

Raspberries
​by Kathy Gilbert
From the farmers’ market coated in fine powder and sweet
Remind me of a Viennese dessert: raspberry, gelatin, whipped cream
My mother made on special occasions

It’s called . . . what is it called?
The name is lost, stuck in my brain, irretrievable now
Like a raspberry seed caught in diverticulitis

Steel wheels of the train from the aerial
shriek and crush the track rebuking me for the word
I cannot find

I search the pockets of my brain
Find only the loose change of the day
Not the word

Let’s see . . . it’s derived from love
A noun, food, dessert, creamy
Feels good in the mouth

A plane booms overhead insistent, thumping
My being into timidity flattened against
The noise of destruction and nothingness

stupid, memory loss, Alzheimer’s

My chest full of bitter cold words
Like snot congealing against the cages of Adam’s ribs
That I am supposed to be derived from

Aha! Bavarian Cream.
The word is made flesh.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kathy Gilbert received her MFA from San Francisco State University in 2013 after a career in public transport. She received the Marc Linenthal Poetry Award in 2012 from SFSU and won the San Francisco Browning Society Gita Specker Award three times for her dramatic monologues. She was commissioned to write a play for the 2015 San Francisco Olympians Festival. Her one act Delphin and the Children of Amphitrite was performed at the Exit Theater. She also tutors third graders, studies tai chi, practices yoga and swims. 
Other works in this issue:
Bay Area Byways
​The New Transbay Terminal in San Francisco - a visual tour 
A Good Day at Pacifica Pier - a visual tour   
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​Vistas & Byways Review is the semiannual journal of fiction, nonfiction and poetry by members of Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) at San Francisco State University​.
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Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at San Francisco State University​ (OLLI at SF State) provides communal and material support to the Vistas & Byways  volunteer staff.