A History of Particles: Ash, Wood, Shrimp
Unsettled and predisposed
to flight, they
rise. Or, awaiting the process, receive
the glow as prelude to transformation, a
nocturnal exegesis inscribed in flame
and black swirls. Death in the air,
settling upon us. The bitterest
taste. But how to explain
the tongueβs sweet tremor? And the narrow
margins between the transition
from wood to smoke?
At 250 degrees
their pale shells redden,
become vessels of radiant
heat and its attenuated function,
moisture retained so as
to delay and heighten the
delectable flesh, once freed, become
virtue, become fate
sliding down the throat,
the course of deterioration hastened
and endured in perpetuity.
This first appeared on the blog in June 2015.
I could have never thought the death and the cooking process of shrimps could be poetically portrayed. Thanks you for this experience.
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Thank you, Pradita. Poetry is all around us, if we look.
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Absolutely! And you have a wonderful way with words to remind us of just that π
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You are very kind.
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My pleasure π
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I do need to read more of you. “Become virtue, become fate…..” Rare as meat. Wonderful.
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Thank you, Ruth Ann. But not well done and served with ketchup. π
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Hah. Always somewhere red and w a little butter….!
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Perhaps a compound butter with herbs and garlic. Mmmmm.
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Reblogged this on O LADO ESCURO DA LUA.
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Thanks for reblogging.
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Interesting how the poet can write the sense from cooking or taste, but we seldom, if ever accurately depict the moments of eating, the chewing etc.
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That is interesting. I’ll have to work on that. Hmm.
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i thought this for a while but just haven’t found myself getting round to it, like so many things.
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I know that feeling!
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Reading this while heating up lunch. Somehow I don’t think my kitchari will send me into poetic thoughts, but I’ll look out for them π
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The spices alone could do that! I’ve never made kitchari. Maybe it’s time!
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Yes, I underestimated the poetry in the spices! Cumin, coriander, mustard, tumeric, asafoetida…enjoyed on a sunny autumn afternoon watching the hillside across my verandah being revealed as the delicate sheets of fog rolled past.
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There you go!
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Gotta say, shrimp poetry was a nice surprise.
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That should be a new category of poetry!
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Best title to a poem… ever!!!
“My name is Okaji-mandias, king of things:
Look on my lime grilled shrimp and despair….
Nothing beside remains… because they were so delicious they have been snapped up by my guests before you arrived!”
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Boundless and bare, the lone and level plates stretch far away… π
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The sizzling shrimp are captured beautifully by your words!
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Thank you, Maria!
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I’m so there. The smoke, the salt, the experiential sweetness. Delicious.
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It has been years since I smoked shrimp. Hmm.
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I like the nocturnal exegesis and the margins between the transition
from wood to smoke. The most profound exegesis on bbq I’ve found! LOL.
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Thanks, D. The art of bbq is profound!
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