Poetry by Bruce C. Mitchell
Poetry by Bruce C. Mitchell
“ORGANIC COMMUNITY”
Szmania’s May 29, 2010 – a Memorial day treat
notes while sitting at the counter, watching food prepared …
The precision of the onion slicer’s moves, oriental in the thinness achieved,
suggests the quality of the meal to come.
“Suggestion,” like in promises of political campaigns, meets reality with frequent
disaster. That same onion slicer then tried to loose a custard from its cup and it
came out in pieces – which imperfection he covered in a waterfall of glistening
sliced red strawberries while talking with other patrons at the counter about what a
sprinkle of Bacardi’s rum would do. Hmmmm. What’s it mean about the meal to come?
In the Gulf of Mexico, an oil leak a mile deep, after shooting 100s of thousands of
gallons a day into the turquoise waters for a month, is hopefully choking on mud
tonight, injected into its hole as a last resort by a Gargantuan syringe. Dead
ducks in brown sludge appeared on TV news all day. Will it be days or weeks or years
or centuries before we know the sum result?
The waitress helped me order from two menu dishes, composing a vegetarian fantasy
from sides and sauces.
It is more difficult, I imagine, to prepare non-proliferation in Korea and Iran,
fight two inherited wars, combat financial decay and deep recession, while
transforming the energy diet of a country and reordering a health care system for
300 million people. Is that a full plate – with flavors it will take centuries to
savor, or what? There is no full job description for a President. So now calls arise
to intervene as oil fouls fishing grounds and comes ashore as gook to cripple life’s
processes in wetlands and on beaches His enemies call it his Katrina, their hope to
discredit fortified by his earlier calls for off-shore drilling on the East coast,
before disaster struck. Folks who denounced big government and said “leave it to the
corporations” now find their path as disastrous as leaving it to Finance back in 2
Oh! Oh! Eight. The recipes for fixes rest on money we do not have and expertise that
does not exist –So different from taking black rice from one dish, and mushrooms
and greens from another, and saying, “Do it up surprisingly.”
The meal arrives. The sauces from their separate origins prove to be giant
complements to each other, distinct yet harmonious, making the onion slicer into a
fortune teller.
Democracy seems an adolescent by comparison, but then its recipes are more obscure,
and events come in more varieties than foods…
© Bruce C. Mitchell