I’ve cooked Alexandre into the greens, stir fried and served on the side. I like spinach with my quiche, arugula in omelets, kale in the vegetable mix becoming a scramble served in a glass bowl to a family. There’s no family or lovers at the dinner, I haven’t spoken to any of them in years; not to Robert, in St Louis, with a new boyfriend, they seem happy, and I’m happy, too, thickly spreading Ryan and Tony, buttery marriage, left me behind one day with just a text, onto the toast, fresh salted bagels and sourdough I sliced myself with my bread knife, I look at the knives and think of Gabe, Joseph, boys I wish I could cut, thinly, slivered onions, thinly cut bacon, anything that feels sharpened and hurt, like I was, so I’m chopping cabbage for a morning slaw, so I’m balancing plates that are all just for me, two eggs, fried, two potatoes, shredded, in the skillet, oiled, and then you, the one I still don’t want to bake, a frittata filled with goat cheese and the sundried tomatoes of your wrinkly, bald head, a smile of Kalamata olives I put out two plates hoping you’d come, I whisked and whisked and poured over the food, I washed fruit, so many berries, a kiwi, so ripe, the skin practically peeling beneath my thumb, I drape it like a coat over my shoulders to keep me warm in those winter months
Sam Herschel Wein (he/they) is a Chicago-based poet who specializes in perpetual frolicking. Their second chapbook, GESUNDHEIT!, a collaboration with Chen Chen, was part of the 2019-2020 Glass Poetry Press Series. He co-founded and edits Underblong. Recent work can be found in Moon City Review, Sundog Lit, and Bat City Review, among others. See what they’re up to at samherschelwein.com.