In my mother's house I learned
What some call pinching pennies, others — thrift.
Scrape the last stubborn bits of tomato
paste from the can. Frame a tourist postcard,
trim the grubby edge. Salvaged buttons in
the cookie tin, a gnawed steak bone for the soup.
What she can't use, she can lack or others
can ache for. I save jars and lids and hope
that I can fill them with nickels or salt.
Winter, 1956: she's a child
fleeing Hungary without a coat. She shows
her mother mittens she found in the snow,
brings them to a church to find the owner.
