It’s rather beyond my ken, this intrepid spirit–or willful folly–that moves anyone to go off into the great unknown and sail over the flat edge of the earth in a pipsqueak of a boat, looking for answers, or for adventure. While I know from my own very limited experience that those things in my life I’ve most treasured generally came at the price of a certain amount of risk beyond my usual, I’ve never quite been able to imagine how there can be people who actually seek such danger, who desire huge challenges. My idea of a grand showdown with Fate falls somewhere between going into a different grocery store than my usual ones and putting on pants that were a little too tight last week.

I am sincerely grateful that there are other people on this planet willing to plunge into the unknown and take on its vagueness and vagaries head first, for without them I wouldn’t exist. It’s not simply that I wouldn’t live in my accustomed comfort and safety, but indeed that I wouldn’t know what was safe-vs-poisonous to eat, let alone which of the seemingly available house-caves were already occupied by less than teddy-cuddly bears. On top of all the basics of safety and shelter and health I am glad that there have been explorers and inventors and pioneers of every sort, all out there avidly finding, making, fixing and each in his or her own way advancing the things that make life so livable nowadays for me and for others like me who are equally unprepared to live on the razor’s edge.

And I’m especially happy that so many survived these trips to the borders of reality and came back to tell the tale. It’s pretty swell for the rest of us, and I’ll bet you, too, are glad to be among the surviving heroes–especially if you’re among the handful that eventually came off the high of discovery and achievement and said to yourselves in a faint echo of what I was saying all along: ‘What on earth was I thinking!‘ If you’d like your thanks at your personal high noon or any other time, I’ll be right here in the safe and comfortable reality you bought for me, slinging no guns at Destiny other than those housed in my safe and comfortable internal universe.

Babylon Creek

used to make the

children laugh as it ran

tickling fingers up

their summer-heated shins

and the older folk

chuckle shamefacedly

at its puns and the way

its hilarious licking made

them squirm like

dog-loved kids themselves

Ecstatic

A quenchless love, dreaming of fire,

In sparkling rain, still heart’s desire;

Still filled with stars and wind and joy

And graces formed without alloy—

A pretty hope, a shining night,

That place where blessings all alight—

Give breath and meaning to all things—

This is my love, and yes, it sings,

For in the center of it all

Into such ecstasy I fall

As cannot be divined or plumbed

When earthly spirits have benumbed

The finer senses made for this—

Stop here, and end it with a kiss!

So if I can make entrees and side dishes that have any value as sustenance and taste enough like dessert so as to make myself feel I’m misbehaving a bit, so much the better. The particular good news in this is that with a whole lot of tasty ingredients, it’s not all that tough to accomplish the task. I mean, if you can take advantage of the Maillard reaction and make sweet caramelization happen to cruciferous vegetables and, yes, even meat, that’s proof enough for me that we are meant to enjoy dessert as any course of a meal. Sexy seared chops and steaks and fish filets, here I come! Succulent Brussels sprouts? But of course! Life is good.And why limit myself to drawing out the sugars in seemingly non-sugary foods when I can embrace the vitamins in vegetables and, what the heck, throw more sugar and spice on top just because I can. Rather delightful, if you ask me, to occasionally set aside the usual mashed potatoes in favor of what is essentially pie filling. So with those juicy sweet chops, I might give in to the urge to treat them and myself to a scoop of deconstructed dessert thus:

Sweet Potato Pie Mash

Take one peeled sweet potato or yam and an equal amount of carrots, and put both raw vegetables into a food processor or heavy-duty blender with a few friends and blend the whole concatenation into fluffy oneness. My choice last time of company for the two cups’ worth of aforementioned sweet spud and carrots: 2 tablespoons butter or coconut oil, half a teaspoon of salt, half a teaspoon of ground cinnamon, a splash of vanilla, one egg and, for added sugar, half a cup of ‘natural’ (handmade) small marshmallows. Because I had them around. Because I have a slight sweets addiction. Because, and I may have mentioned this before*, I’m a little kid. Last move with this mash is to heat it up–just bake or microwave it in a greased heat-proof dish long enough to heat it through fully, and it makes a delightful pie-like accompaniment to practically anything, including, well, a plain old spoon. Candy, I tell you. But chock full of vitamins. Or close enough to encourage me to absolve myself of any misdeeds until the next over-the-top meal.

Yes indeedy, I *did* pour a little cream on the mash, too, because it tasted so much like pie. But then again, I have been known to put crisped bacon or (as here) chicken cracklings on top for a savory finish. Am I a dietary lost cause? Perhaps. But a happy one.

Shells of glass to shield from winter

Leaf and flower, root and seed

Give the tender lives inside them

Shelter that they crave and need

In the warming arms of friendship

We in kind find safety, grace,

Shelter from the world’s hard trials

In that other shielding place

Every particle of me

(At least those parts the world can see)

Works smoothly to create the masks

Compliant with my daily tasks

So no one guesses that down deep

My inner monster’s just asleep.

Cow Art

I wonder if you flinch at all

At cows upon the bedroom wall

That have great horns and twitching tails—

The massive cow that seldom fails

To win a ribbon at the fair—

Perhaps it’s odd to see them thereBut I admire those cows, you see,

And like them watching over me

To fend off any sleepless nights

And fill my dreams with cow delights

Traveling at Speed

When I was just a little tad

And full of zest and vim

I never thought the day would come

When eyesight could grow dim

And hair fall out, and memories

Impossible to keep,

Or that my middle would go soft

Or I would fall asleep

Just trying to sit through the news,

But couldn’t sleep at night,

Get creaky and arthritic

And develop underbite,

But, over and above these things,

No way would I have guessed

The day would pounce so suddenly,

So early. I’m depressed!