Genre
The Ice Cream Makers of Khatgal
John Delaney
issue three
The Ice Cream Makers of Khatgal
‘What do you want to be when you retire?’
The engineer and his accountant wife
flipped the childhood question on its head.
Here they stood before their ice cream machine.
We each got a cone and filled it ourselves,
pulling down the handle and swirling in
the soft, cream-colored yak-milk delight.
It was buttery sweet and delicious.
So they have a thriving business in town,
and even deliver to surrounding hotels.
In today’s market, anything ‘organic’ sells,
and, clearly, they’re not ready to slow down.
Yes, retirement can taste like an ice cream cone.
About the Author
My publications include Waypoints (2017), a collection of place poems, Twenty Questions (2019), a chapbook, Delicate Arch (2022), poems and photographs of national parks and monuments, Galápagos (2023), a collaborative chapbook of my son Andrew’s photographs and my poems, Nile (2024), poems and photographs about Egypt, and Filing Order: Sonnets (2025). I live in Port Townsend, WA.
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