Leeks

Source: OregonLive.com

We planted the seeds in the spring
And up they came innocuous as crabgrass.
The tomatoes soon lorded over them,
And even the jalapenos, sad lumps
Hanging from their limbs like mittens
From children playing in the snow.

They stayed that way all summer,
And before the frosts of November
We pulled them up, declaring failure,
And used them as scallions in salads.
Winter white covered the clay soil,
Like layers of dust in an unused room.

Till spring bullied us into wakefulness:
Thunder and lightning and the gray rain
That heartens depressives with reasons
For misery, then out of the sodden ground,
Tiny blades twisting in the wound
Of the old season. It was shocking:

Nothing worse than discarded hopes
Butting in when you have given up,
Thrusting faith into comfortable loss,
Demanding your heart again because
This time they've made a proper start,
This time they will rise in triumph.

~ Richard Spilman

Leeks

Source: OregonLive.com

We planted the seeds in the spring
And up they came innocuous as crabgrass.
The tomatoes soon lorded over them,
And even the jalapenos, sad lumps
Hanging from their limbs like mittens
From children playing in the snow.

They stayed that way all summer,
And before the frosts of November
We pulled them up, declaring failure,
And used them as scallions in salads.
Winter white covered the clay soil,
Like layers of dust in an unused room.

Till spring bullied us into wakefulness:
Thunder and lightning and the gray rain
That heartens depressives with reasons
For misery, then out of the sodden ground,
Tiny blades twisting in the wound
Of the old season. It was shocking:

Nothing worse than discarded hopes
Butting in when you have given up,
Thrusting faith into comfortable loss,
Demanding your heart again because
This time they've made a proper start,
This time they will rise in triumph.

~ Richard Spilman

Quote on beet

Credit: Pierre Obendrauf / Postmedia News Service

The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly, is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious.

Slavic peoples get their physical characteristics from potatoes, their smoldering inquietude from radishes, their seriousness from beets.

The beet is the melancholy vegetable, the one most willing to suffer. You can't squeeze blood out of a turnip...

The beet is the murderer returned to the scene of the crime. The beet is what happens when the cherry finishes with the carrot. The beet is the ancient ancestor of the autumn moon, bearded, buried, all but fossilized; the dark green sails of the grounded moon-boat stitched with veins of primordial plasma; the kite string that once connected the moon to the Earth now a muddy whisker drilling desperately for rubies.

The beet was Rasputin's favorite vegetable. You could see it in his eyes.

~ Tom Robbins

Quote on beet

Credit: Pierre Obendrauf / Postmedia News Service

The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly, is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious.

Slavic peoples get their physical characteristics from potatoes, their smoldering inquietude from radishes, their seriousness from beets.

The beet is the melancholy vegetable, the one most willing to suffer. You can't squeeze blood out of a turnip...

The beet is the murderer returned to the scene of the crime. The beet is what happens when the cherry finishes with the carrot. The beet is the ancient ancestor of the autumn moon, bearded, buried, all but fossilized; the dark green sails of the grounded moon-boat stitched with veins of primordial plasma; the kite string that once connected the moon to the Earth now a muddy whisker drilling desperately for rubies.

The beet was Rasputin's favorite vegetable. You could see it in his eyes.

~ Tom Robbins

The Kitchen Weeps Onion

Source: twisted-ghosts.tumblr/Favim

The kitchen weeps onion because
the cook is dead. Pans strike chorus, and the ladles
keep a knock-kneed stride. Burners

gleam more brightly. Chives, chives, and chives. Everyone seems
so tired, but the diners cannot sleep. The kitchen tonight
weeps onion, so everyone else must weep.

What’s the use in talking? Let’s touch, and
turn apart. The cook is quiet, cold, unearthly, and
the turnip breaks its heart.

~ James Arthur

The Kitchen Weeps Onion

Source: twisted-ghosts.tumblr/Favim

The kitchen weeps onion because
the cook is dead. Pans strike chorus, and the ladles
keep a knock-kneed stride. Burners

gleam more brightly. Chives, chives, and chives. Everyone seems
so tired, but the diners cannot sleep. The kitchen tonight
weeps onion, so everyone else must weep.

What’s the use in talking? Let’s touch, and
turn apart. The cook is quiet, cold, unearthly, and
the turnip breaks its heart.

~ James Arthur

Pickling the Chilies

Credit: Lacey @ Thyme On My Side

for R.F. Brissenden in memory 

The last light slants
across the garden

the tops of the pines
are on fire noisy
 
with flights
of galahs

the walnut tree
is already bare
 
branching veins
against the sky

in the deepening shadows
of the kitchen
 
our morning's work
lined up in clean glass jars
 
jalapenos like polished
malachite
 
seed brought from Mexico
in some traveller's pocket
 
long slim cayenne
dark green and fiery red
 
would have given you
such simple pleasure
 
and later the long dinners
of hot Thai made with them
 
all day we have kept
on four loads of laundry
 
sheets and white napkins
from our Easter meal together
 
the pleasure of taking it down
of folding and storing
 
the chilies to be eaten
next year
 
though still beautiful
will be less only
 
some small faith
put down in jars
 
for the time
to come

~ Nicolette Stasko

Pickling the Chilies

Credit: Lacey @ Thyme On My Side

for R.F. Brissenden in memory 

The last light slants
across the garden

the tops of the pines
are on fire noisy
 
with flights
of galahs

the walnut tree
is already bare
 
branching veins
against the sky

in the deepening shadows
of the kitchen
 
our morning's work
lined up in clean glass jars
 
jalapenos like polished
malachite
 
seed brought from Mexico
in some traveller's pocket
 
long slim cayenne
dark green and fiery red
 
would have given you
such simple pleasure
 
and later the long dinners
of hot Thai made with them
 
all day we have kept
on four loads of laundry
 
sheets and white napkins
from our Easter meal together
 
the pleasure of taking it down
of folding and storing
 
the chilies to be eaten
next year
 
though still beautiful
will be less only
 
some small faith
put down in jars
 
for the time
to come

~ Nicolette Stasko

Slanting Light

Source: Unknown

Slanting light casts onto a stucco wall
the shadows of upwardly zigzagging plum branches.

I can see the thinning of branches to the very twig.
I have to sift what you say, what she thinks,

what he believes is genetic strength, what
they agree is inevitable. I have to sift this

quirky and lashing stillness of form to see myself,
even as I see laid out on a table for Death

an assortment of pomegranates and gourds.
And what if Death eats a few pomegranate seeds?

Does it insure a few years of pungent spring?
I see one gourd, yellow from midsection to top

and zucchini-green lower down, but
already the big orange gourd is gnawed black.

I have no idea why the one survives the killing nights.
I have to sift what you said, what I felt,

what you hoped, what I knew. I have to sift
death as the stark light sifts the branches of the plum.

~ Arthur Sze

Slanting Light

Source: Unknown

Slanting light casts onto a stucco wall
the shadows of upwardly zigzagging plum branches.

I can see the thinning of branches to the very twig.
I have to sift what you say, what she thinks,

what he believes is genetic strength, what
they agree is inevitable. I have to sift this

quirky and lashing stillness of form to see myself,
even as I see laid out on a table for Death

an assortment of pomegranates and gourds.
And what if Death eats a few pomegranate seeds?

Does it insure a few years of pungent spring?
I see one gourd, yellow from midsection to top

and zucchini-green lower down, but
already the big orange gourd is gnawed black.

I have no idea why the one survives the killing nights.
I have to sift what you said, what I felt,

what you hoped, what I knew. I have to sift
death as the stark light sifts the branches of the plum.

~ Arthur Sze

Quote on potatoes

Photo credit: Kevin_P from morguefile.com

So what is the best vegetable? Well, we all know that: it's the potato. The vegetable you can't screw up. You can throw a potato into a bonfire, run away from it - and, an hour later, it's turned into a meal. Try doing that with broccoli, or a trifle, and it will laugh in your face.

~ Caitlin Moran

Quote on potatoes

Photo credit: Kevin_P from morguefile.com

So what is the best vegetable? Well, we all know that: it's the potato. The vegetable you can't screw up. You can throw a potato into a bonfire, run away from it - and, an hour later, it's turned into a meal. Try doing that with broccoli, or a trifle, and it will laugh in your face.

~ Caitlin Moran

Ode to Tomatoes

Photo credit: raymortim from morguefile.com

they make
friends
anywhere

red
smiles
in salads

tender
young
generous

hot
salsa
dancers

round
cardinals
of the kitchen

hard
to imagine
cooking

without
first asking
their blessings!

~ Francisco X. Alarcón

Ode to Tomatoes

Photo credit: raymortim from morguefile.com

they make
friends
anywhere

red
smiles
in salads

tender
young
generous

hot
salsa
dancers

round
cardinals
of the kitchen

hard
to imagine
cooking

without
first asking
their blessings!

~ Francisco X. Alarcón