German Apple Strudel
by Shelby Kruger
“You must be careful
so the dough doesn’t rip,” he says.
“In the Milwaukee house, we would stretch
it out to cover the whole dining table.”
Then it was braided and baked,
long enough so all ten mouths
could have a piece of the fruit
wrapped in crust and crystalline sugar.
Of ten apples my grandfather
is the last of three,
thick skinned and rosy
with a beacon gleam.
He grins at a distant weather forecast,
says, “It’s 22° all the way in Saint Paul.”
Not cold for the boy who trudged uphill
both ways in six feet of snow.
He means, “Are you sure you want to leave?”
I pretend that 2000 miles isn’t daunting,
imagine dough stretching, rolling out across
state lines as we blanket a buttered pan.
That evening I unwrap military grade
snowshoes from Colorado. I pull
the woven straps around my feet
as a raspy chuckle fills the living room.
Later I remind him where middle C is,
and he plays a line of Jingle Bells, slowly.
I watch the wrinkles stretch and unfurl
from his crooked, spotted knuckles.
He lifts his hands on sleigh, recalls
how he would hide alone
in the closet, clutching the cat,
when the Milwaukee house got loud.
When the shouting stopped
he would emerge, and translate
the newspaper for great grandfather
from English to German.
My mother will sometimes say
“Grandpa is a shower, not a teller.”
You watch from a distance, then
remember and replicate later.
I can’t picture him afraid, as he tells
me where to sprinkle the raisins,
points with a shaking finger to the tiny ants
secure in their sweet flour shell.
I ask if he still eats his apple cores
seeds and all, as I have secretly learned
to do, too. He answers “I used to,
when I was young and stupid.”
A seed sticks in my gap tooth,
stupid cyanide smile,
while he weaves the dough
in and out of itself.
Then I lick the frosting spoon,
like my mother was never allowed,
while we sit together and wait
for the oven timer’s ring.