As Promised

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Leggo My Oeuf

Phacellophora camtschatica, the fried egg jellyfish.  Really.

Today I thought I might just lay my head on the keyboard and see what it spelled out, but then I saw a discussion on Dining@Large about putting a fried egg on a bison burger.   Here you go.  This is probably the only verse meditation upon that subject.   I didn't think much of this poem at first, but it grew on me a little.   Mixing some Sartrian (is that a word?) existential concepts into lunch dishes is novel.  With Being-in-itself you get egg roll.   Definitely a nominee for the Pretentious Bastard Hall of Fame.

 

                        The Oeuf of Paris
   
                                         A man is what he eats, but a people eats what it is.
                                         – Socrates
   
In the land of super suede brief cases 
all I see is, how would Sartre have said it, 
the thing-in-itself – the egg.
   
“It is the French way.”
   
Thai cabbage salad with peanut
sauce: where’s the spice, the umph?
Instead a hard boiled egg on top.
   
“But that is how it is done.”
   
A floating oeuf dur regatta on 
Bengali shrimp soup?  
   
“It’s the essence of life.”
   
It may have been a life, but on a pizza,
it’s an arrogant slimy eye.
   
The thing-in-itself, for Parisians
is being Parisian, seeing
themselves winking back
from their pizza, being-as-food.

 
1999

Clouds got in my way

Suck on this Joni Mitchell.  Well isn't that a great way to start the day?  Our author seems to be able to find menace almost anywhere.  I found an even more angry cloud poem, but that will have to wait.

            The Violence of Clouds

           Shrieking white rips the
           blue. Cirrus-serrated
           gashes acid-sear gouging
           ice-crystal rasp-ripping.  

Cumulus layer on layer blubber-tumbles
havoc, cirrus sprint shredded
slivers of white joint-torn
steel-shard splintered, 
                                         phlegm-belching
cumulus damning cirrus, lacquers
up the blue, and
                              scars slide off to
                              sight’s horizon.

 

2002

He ain't heavy Father, he's my noodle

Oh whoa is he.  First up is a tale of whoa and pretension replete with newly minted words as if English is just not big enough for his massive emotional spectrum.  I can't resist a poem that ends with the line: You want fries with that, Sir?  

Then something more fun.  Wow, how awesome is the picture below.  Sadly this artist's other works are really creepy, with a lot of semi-naked elf girls.  This one is called "Bad Date".

BTW the post title comes from my favorite New Yorker cartoon which I can't find a copy of.  It shows a priest talking to a human-sized fork with a large noodle in its tines.  The fork says ...

 

 

      Tormemorenting No More

I will language 
you away
cast your meaning

from my heart
de(-ar)range the thought
  I gave you
  to begin with

make you a silly sentence
of squeaking styrofoam
tumbling behind a Burger King

the little voice of
I love you
now c(r)ackling to the indiffident

through the metal box,

You want fries with that, Sir?

1998

 

 

                    Fellini Dates Heidi
   
The waiter’s nose slides
off his face into her water glass.
She retrieves it with her soup spoon.
   
I order the live Maine lobster,
knocked senseless and served on a bed 
of blurry naked pictures of the Pope’s mother.
   
She has a glass of blush and a self cleaning 
forkful of Caesar salad, no anchovy 
dressing on the side.
   
She makes conversation like a mortician presenting the bill.

I loved the movie: Bloodbath of the Apocalypse.
She swears it was The Sound of Music II – Return to Edelweiss.

I set fire to the bathroom to avoid paying the check.

After slips and snaps and straps, things are ironed out.

 

Mmm...  goaty.

Is that the Brass Elephant?

Fusion food at its finest.

                                Tonight’s Specials

My name.
Is Ricardo.
I will be.
Your server.
Before we start                                      Stockinged toes intrude.
I will describe                                        Not my wife’s.
some items                                             Maneuvering.
not on the menu.
We are offering a                                   Calf.
lemon                                                      Thigh.
vodka                                                      ...
fettucini
done lightly                                            Hand inches under fabric.
in a splash of virgin
olive oil over ...                                      Lace pantied expectation.

as an appetizer
or an entrée ...                                       Marinated in hope.

brushed with
almond butter, grilled ...                      To imagined perfection
                                                                at the end of every
broiled ...                                                fingertip landing
baked ...
sautéed ...                                              simmering skin
appetizer/entrée                                 Cajun barbecued ribs
eightfifty
singed flamed crushed                  her husband
strained mashed boiled                             my wife
burgled werst vork tel                  sprinkled with
walgrus hortense panopoly          seering passion
weasel bandaid refried ...                           or just
hot and sour ...
new potatoes                       on the side.
   

1990/1997

The Post-SPAMism Affair

Post Spamism: Naked and Loathing

My best friend’s 
wife. I used to hate her guts
called her stupid.
Ant brained. Dilettante, Necco wafer,
desiccated single celled academic ...
whacked me so
hard a canine 
punched—cheek—blood           tasting…
 
(tasting)I loathe her
pinch the skin in the small
of her back
between my lips,
trickle sweat taste
distracts from the tedia of
post Joycean food 
metaphorks, bendless
Virgina Woof parabulls,
and lecjures on Spam as
a cultural icon.

Will Someone Please Kill Mr. Kinski

What makes an excellent palate cleanser for the horror that is Christmas in America?  Some quotes by Klaus Kinski of course.  Talk about getting the face you deserve.  The title of this post comes froma short film that I saw a few years ago at the Maryland Film Festival.  The next time you are bitching about a co-worker, employee or boss, just imagine what your work day would be like if it involved Klaus Kinski.  See the short film here.

People think we had a love-hate relationship. Well, I did not love him, nor did I hate him. We had mutual respect for each other, even as we both planned each other's murder.

- Werner Herzog on Kinski

Herzog is a miserable, hateful, malevolent, avaricious, money-hungry, nasty, sadistic, treacherous, cowardly creep...he should be thrown alive to the crocodiles! An anaconda should strangle him slowly! A poisonous spider should sting him and paralyze his lungs! The most venomous serpent should bite him and make his brain explode! No panther claws should rip open his throat--that would be much too good for him! Huge red ants should piss into his lying eyes and gobble up his balls and his guts! He should catch the plague! Syphilis! Yellow fever! Leprosy! It's no use; the more I wish him the most gruesome deaths, the more he haunts me.

- Kinski on Herzog

And some more wisdom from Mr. Kinski

I am your fairy tale. Your dream. Your wishes and desires, and I am your thirst and your hunger and your food and your drink. 

I didn't choose solitude. 

I don't need anybody to tell me how to be alive. 

I have to shoot without any breaks. I yell at Herzog and hit him. I have to fight for every sequence. I wish Herzog would catch the plague, more than ever. 

I knew there were, in myself, the souls of millions of people who lived centuries ago; not just people but animals, plants, the elements, things, even, matter. All of these exist in me. 

One should judge a man mainly from his depravities. Virtues can be faked. Depravities are real. 

People who do not see the terrible things therefore do not see the beautiful things, either.

Sometimes my heart hurts so much, I beat it with my fists. I try to run. But you cannot run from this. It waits for you. Even when you think you have escaped it, it is there.

The truth is, I can never die. For I will be in everything and see you in everything and watch over you. I am your reaction in the water of a mountain lake. 
Klaus Kinski 

The ultimate acting is to destroy yourself.

Merry Öwl Meatmäs

Merry Öwl Meatmäs

Here at stately Owl Manor, we have eschewed the usual sturm und drang, weltschmerz and schadenfreude today and have given in to Christmas - Owl Meat style.  
 
I combined elements of my German and Mexican heritage to give you a glimpse of the holiday festivities here. First up is El Vez doing a killer version of Feliz Navidad. If you don't love this video, you have no soul. For those not familiar with El Vez, he is the Mexican Elvis and he LOVES Christmas. Does it get any better than Melvis dancing with a giant inflatable Santa and Frosty, while his band lays down some chunky Ramones-style thrash? I want his suit.  

While bearing a striking resemblance to the late German maniac/actor Klaus Kinski, the photo above is of Krampus. Who is Krampus you say? Mein Gott im Himmel! Clearly you did not grow up in the Bavarian alps. Krampus is Saint Nick's evil assistant. How very, uh, German. He is bad cop to Santa's good cop. Krampus Night is celebrated on December 5, the eve of Saint Nick's birthday. So what does Santa's assistant do? He, meaning any able-bodied man, roams the streets frightening children and whacking women on the gluteus festivus with a stick. Drinking heavily is part of the ritual, which may explain why it goes on for two weeks. Nothing says Happy Birthday Jesus like binge drinking, dancing around fires, and random sexual assault.  
 
Now how do we combine such seemingly non-intersecting cutlures and traditions at Christmas? With food of course. No Mexican Christmas would be complete without the special pork tamales. What makes them special? The addition of one or more secret ingredients, which I think is cinnamon and rabbit. One can never be sure. Tio Toro always brings his gucamole with mango and some amazing ceviche to celebrate his roots in Veracruz. The best of all is his ceviche de pulpo - citrus marinated octopus. Mmmm... que bueno.
 
The German part of the feast is short on tradition and long on meat. Cousins Dieter and Elsebeth grill something Dieter has recently killed on a bow hunting trip. In the past we have had elk, bear, and Canadian snowshoe hares (with a bow?). Elsebeth's bear paw soup was delcious and not at all frightening. Naturally there is homemade sauerkraut and a fermented beet juice that has purported rejuvenating qualities.
 
Another thing that unites both sides of the family is beating something with a stick. Since my lawyer says that our Krampus days are kaput, we have allowed the German side to make their own version of the piñata. Last year it was stuffed with homemade venison jerky and gherkins. I guess we will have to wait to see if Uncle Klaus and cousin Dieter's hunting trip to Canada was successful. The form of the piñata will be of whatever public figure has aggrieved them most this year. It could be anyone from Rod Blagojovich to Hugh Jackman or even Billy Mays.  Can you imagine how history might have been different if the Germans had invented the siesta and the piñata?
 
Of course the evening always ends with drinking and dancing. Uncle Flaco acts as DJ, spinning vinyl copies of his favorite Norteño music, which sounds like Mexican polka to me. The night usually ends with Great Uncle Fritz announcing Archimedes-in-the-bathtub style that the Mexicans stole their music from the Germans, as if he just discovered this. But harmony prevails, because I have hidden the tequila and Jagermeister and bellies are full of elk jerky and pork tamales as El Vez rips into "Feliz Navidad" again.
 
Frohe Weihnachten de Carne de Buho.
(Merry Christmas from Owl Meat.)