By Course and Discourse, and: Nomadic Miniatures
Rent from DeepDyve- By Course and Discourse, and: Nomadic Miniatures
By Course and Discourse
for Jean-Charles Brédas, award-winning chef from Martinique, whose creations combine ingredients from cuisines around the world
Such a delicious trip To take by course and discourse, Gluttony for crew, Jean-Charles Brédas in the furnace room. There, where the White River flows, Our frank Creolity pours forth: The Chief’s face is august, Agamemnon’s proud mask of gold, Brédas in his fief, Creole, Not in narrowness—no!— In beautiful universality. Of haute cuisine, Jean-Charles is a Chevalier, heroic And gifted master cook. By synesthesia so sweet, His art makes our senses reel: Juiciness we see, Refinement we breathe in, Subtle nuances perfume And fill our taste buds with bliss. To feast on one of Jean-Charles’s meals Is not a joy of which we speak Lightly, but rather we enjoy In reverence, tuned in To the most refined “Carpe diem!” [End Page 72]
Chef Brédas, this is why I love you, Master-at-arms of the mouth, Who pays innovative homage To matrimonial heritage Of our potomitan of days gone by— Grands-manmans and upright wives— From a coulis of passion fruit, arousing The taste of foie gras, of fish, You know how to concoct so many delights To design with a delicate touch In devotion worthy of myth, Celebration with no end, The fête of flavors of mixed descent.
Rivière Blanche, 2007
Nomadic Miniatures
There are those who are born of the sun who, by their lips, give life to the withered leaf*
mazisi kunene
1. day full of light night dreamily nude swallowed stars day’s catapult waits for the sun to turn the barren sea carmine
we live at the sun’s threshold you don’t believe me? come inspect my home if you’d like [End Page 73]
colors of day rise up again from the well (night) hate descends to threaten the tribe
spiraling notes of the muezzin (cowhand of dawn) have just given a sign to the dying stars
2. bohemian themes for nomadic poems
the poet is dying here in this world he only survives in the bosom of memory amassing a small store of works fine watercolor art parcels of life
we wrestle with life to make it worthwhile why just blame our rebellious youth?
to milk of day I prefer ink of night
humanity is a network and what about this great sky color of earth?
Nancy Naomi Carlson has received grants from the Maryland Arts Council and the Arts and Humanities Council of Montgomery County, as well as a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in literature translation. She recently published Stone Lyre: Poems of Renee Char. She coordinates the graduate school counseling program at the University of the District of Columbia and is an associate editor for Tupelo Press.
Footnotes
Note: Potomitan is the Creole word for “pillars of strength”; grands-manmans is Creole for “grandmas.”
*From “Return of the Golden Age” in The Ancestors and the Sacred Mountain (London: Heinemann, 1982). Mazisi Kunene, poet from South Africa, was born in 1930 and wrote in Zulu. He translated his own work into English. [End Page 74]
