Poetry of Issue #7        Page 2

Fish-Head Soup

Everything points to fish-head soup. Not a menu item but a way of life. You’ve brewed it before, you can do it again. Onion, celery, carrot, fennel seeds. Bay leaf, thyme, parsley, garlic, chopped tomatoes. Saffron, white wine, tomato puree. Note the expression on the fish. They take their beheading seriously. They don’t engage in falsetto smiles the way people do when embarrassed. The fish look forward to self-effacement of the purest kind, that which leaves only the intellect shimmering in vapor. You’ve expressed a comparable desire for the infinite. But nothing is less abstract than a fish head neatly severed and packaged in cellowrap in our local supermarket. So many fish have joined the queue. So many blunt expressions have terminated in a perpetual present tense. You have my favorite recipe in mind, yet you hesitate. When I articulate my desire for fish-head soup for dinner tonight you turn and look at me with your eyes on the sides of your head. In that empathic stance you can’t see me clearly, but you can express a downturn of ecological angst. Yes, I appreciate the fact that someone has beheaded these fish with a large and authoritarian implement. Yes, I realize it could have been you or me or anyone. Yes, I realize that the fish might postulate human-head soup as an alternative. Not as a menu item but as a way of life.