Artichokes

My mother coveted the artichoke's heart
But I preferred the leaves,
Dipped one by one in mayonnaise
Then scraped across the teeth.

Mullato men macheted the stalks
In a violent Georgia field.
Before a brown servant steamed them
In a gigantic, blackened pot.

The family of five found peculiar ways
To assault the artichoke center:
My brother plucked from north to south,
My sister dismembered in circles.

My father constructed a wall of green,
A plate of murdered tongues,
His Sherman march surrounded the core
The dinner light yellow and lean.

A feast of leaves, a harvest of hearts
With mayonnaise for flavor.
Atlanta cicadas screamed through screens,
Before Huntley and Brinkley got started.


-- from The Dunes Review, December, 2002



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