To a Rosh Hashanah Challah, and: Picasso, the Greedy Child (Le Gourmet), and: The Fava Bean Eaters

Sweet bread, stern in youreternal roundness, I sneak piecesof your crust at midnight—

for isn’t yours the sacredcircle that we want for asweet new year?

The baker infused youwith honey to make us happy,& maybe her kitchen miracle will work:

sugar the bitter, renewour sour apples in an orchardthat greens our table.

Sweet challah, you’re not my bread, not mytall Italian panettone, not my muscular panforte: you’re somebody else’s promise

for twelve months of pleasure, & as I nibbleyour wild milky eggy sugars, & lick yourwishes, tastes of the new

butter up the stiff stuff & liven withrare syrups of the desertthe staleness we want to forget.

Picasso, the Greedy Child (Le Gourmet)

Edge of the table, edge of thetoo-big bowl, mouth of blue

shadow opening behind the littlestubborn one who scoops

the last spoonful ofsoup, of cream, of

sun, of dusk, ofsweet, of serious, of

now, as sheintently

hovers over a silentdapple

The Fava Bean Eaters

(In memory of Gwendolyn Brooks: “They Eat Beans Mostly, This Old Yellow Pair”)

We’re dining at Frangipane—and who are theypeering through plate glass to watch us drink and eat?

We nibble gravlax, pureed fava beans,The colors here are cream & crimson, mostly.

Here’s Breton lobster salad, shall we share this?The sommelier pours wine; outside, the old

too shabby couple gazes at my yellow curls.Why do they peep—that filthy pair?