my kitchen, a window

Over a simple dessert of

clementines and conversation,

she rubs her belly and offers some advice:

"Wouldn't you love

to make a living doing this?"

||

I've just served her collard greens,

slow cooked in a cast iron pot,

soothed with butter until the leaves

fold like gentle yoga.

||

She says it's the closest thing to Georgia

she's tasted west of Texas and north

of the Mason-Dixon line.

I can tell by the way her eyes

slip towards the window

that her memories of home

don't warm her like mine do,

but there's something to be said

for proper collard greens.

||

I've never cooked in a restaurant.

Never felt my feet grip rubber mats

or said Order up! in anything but fun.

I've never worked a line or station,

but I've seen the dance they talk about.

||

My kitchen fits one comfortably,

but two people who know what they're doing

can make dinner prep look like

a game of Mousetrap, or a Rube-Goldberg machine –

every bowl and body part set just in time to receive

the egg yolks, the soaked beans, the cream sauce near to

breaking.

||

It's no secret that I sing to my garlic.

||

The nicest man I ever cooked for

swore he could taste melodies in my soup.

I can conjure my grandmother

with an onion, a frying pan, and a fire.

I'm not sure they teach you this in cooking school.

||

So, no. I won't ever make a living out of these acts

of soup and birthday cake.

Instead, I'll cook like homesick medicine,

turn my built-for-one kitchen into a window

that frames your belly's desire,

where the scent of garlic and collard greens

can set you dreaming

of home.