A Treatise on Cooking

“Dry-hearted as Peer Gynt
I pare away, no hero,
merely a cook.”
– Peeling Onions, Adrienne Rich

I want to be all things earth-bred,
multi-layered like a cabbage,
yellowing, browning,
intimate with my own entrails,
and yet not packed to capacity
in the cage of my mind.

I want the utilitarian kindness of leftovers:
offal and bones
and meat scraps and trimmings,
and the remaining guilt of
violence’s sanctioned consumption.

When I have cooked all that I desire,
I want my heart to break itself out
of my ribcage
and come sit on my sleeve
to have a final taste of freedom.

Like a haruspex¹,
I want to be able to identify the omens
absorbed in my organs:
the post-purging breaking of the cells,
soul spilling like an overflowing jug of sherbet,
sins stiffening in the ecosystem of death.

Science says that the enzymatic bodily rot starts
in the liver
and in the brain
for all that’s liquid
has the instinctive recognition of freedom.

Tongue lapping at the shore of hunger,
I wait to be spilled out
from my own body,
brimming with purpose
like a holy river.

¹Haruspex: In ancient Rome, a religious official who interpreted omens by examining the entrails of sacrificial animals.