Almost caught up! Now I just have to get today’s done.. today. Day twenty of NaPoWriMo was to write a poem about a handmade or homemade gift that you have received. I rather small and I’m known to eat anything at least once, so people bring me a lot of food at work. I also work a 12+ hour night-shift.
‘Lunch Break Feast’
Fried plantains in honey, steamed buns, sticky rice in bamboo,
Cuban coffee, black beans and rice, egg rolls with peanuts:
We eat it all together, because we cannot sleep.
They pinch my sides and tell me I need to eat more
More, more, more: turning around I am
Already across the floor, they didn’t know you could walk
So fast without running until they met me.
They began to feed me because they got tired
Of the sandwich crackers and redbull, handful of peanuts,
Handful of nothing much, and not enough.
They do not like my bones.
I bring them pumpkin bread and fried wings:
I am learning to cook everything
My mother never taught me how to cook.
Now, I am trying to wake up before we clock in,
We each bring a feast made with our pantry things.
I learned how to make pork with mint, black rice, sour bread,
We give, and we give, and we give what work does not give.
They pinch my sides and I learned how to pinch back,
To rest and not run away, up and down the floor,
Back and forth, back and forth twelve hours or more.
We eat because we cannot sleep: there are still hours
Left of today.
Little Thoughts and Actions 