Dreams like Vinaigrette, a Poem by Mark Tulin

 

Every time I eat exotic food,

I get weird dreams.

 

It must be the person

who prepares the meal,

I determine.

 

A seasoned cook, perhaps

with soft hands

and stubby fingers

or the sous chef

with a furrowed brow

and a ponytail.

 

The cook’s life experiences:

fears, family circumstances,

relationships that have gone sour,

successes and failures,

crimes of narrow escape.

 

Or perhaps those hot love affairs

that have managed to enter my belly

in the form of  Swedish meatballs

or a Chinese salad with a sweet vinaigrette.

 

The food seems to bare the essence

of the cook who prepares it,

as if the person’s blood were circulating

through the Bouillabaisse. 

 

The meal is in my dreams

climbing up a steep wall,

eluding entrapments,

accidentally stepping into 

dark, forbidden halls.

 

As the cook stands over the stove 

and tosses the vegetables into a wok,

I could hear his whole life sizzle.

 

This poem first published in the Scarlet Leaf Review in the March/April 2019 issue.