Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?

I baked a Leprechaun Trap Cake for my friend Amelia's totally rad blog and I'm pretty psyched about it.  Read all about baking versus cooking, and sugar versus love, here.

Then add Bon Appetempt to your Reader and have a magical day!

Love,
Kara

P.S. What's that?  A poem you say?  Certainly!  Hang on to your hats.  This one's a WILD one.  (Stay tuned for a recorded reading of this poem by a fellow nerd...any volunteers?)

I am dedicating the inclusion of this poem to J.L. Conrad, who also writes wild poems about farm and circus and other beloved animals.  Check out her astonishing book, A Cartography of Birds, and see for yourself!

P.P.S. I went to my second-only county fair on Saturday night, which is perhaps why farm animals are on the brain. 

I once told Tim that I LOVE the fact that he is from Ohio.  He says that was a first for him.  Getting to the county fair on a date for the first time when you are 33 is just one of the perils of growing up in New England.  Just kidding.  BIG LOVE, Connecticut!  All the states I've lived in are rad.  Okay.  Now for that poem...


Although I Sweeten Myself with Sugar
by Rodica Draghincescu

My hands filled with sugar
(a new being? lucky?)
I met him along the railroad tracks
watching over his ruddy goats
HOW DO YOU DO?  DID YOU SLEEP WELL?
good morning I MEAN CAN'T
YOU SEE IT'S STILL NIGHT
the DAYS have turned to grass
and GRASS isn't good for these animals any longer
I've brought you sugar
the goats bleat whenever they feel like it
their bleating has stopped - in goat language this is called
FREEDOM - I'm about to experience the sensation that I've
DISCOVERED DOCILE SOUNDS IN MY LARYNX
that won't cause me trouble
B A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A H
Dear mr. goatherd I've brought you
sugar
I reach out my hand - I don't know
why it's said THIS WAY when in FACT
the movement is made with the root fastened
between shoulder blade and breast WHICH breast
is BIGGER: it's learned to sing and TO
TALK: NURSING this other condition
scares it depresses it leads it to droop it wishes
IT HAD EYES to scope out temptations UNDERNEATH clothes
although I sweeten myself
with sugar I'M ONE OF THOSE
WHO DON'T DO a lot of good for the REPRESENTATIVE
ORGANS now for INSTANCE grass
grown on THIGHS is poisonous to goats
THAT'S WHY I reach out my hand filled with sugar
DEAR MR. goatherd TASTE it
for YOURSELF
(meanwhile) the indifferent or CAPABLE goats
have stopped the freight train at the railroad museum
where the railroad clerk MR. SCOW was celebrating his WEDDING VOWS
they were sitting DUMFOUNDED wearing IN PERPETUITY
kaleidoscopic CARDBOARD flowers attached with SAFETY
PINS TO THE CIRCUMFERENCE OF THEIR HEARTS
WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE
HEY HEY WHEE COME ON HEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
(a SOLDIER escaped from his UNIT
was trying to remedy the error)
LET'S GET A MOVE ON  / farther ahead IT'S THERE /
the wedding OF dead goats
WE GONNA MAKE choice VITTLES
DEAR MR. GOATHERD
the museum's freight train is like a kind of LOVE
you've give up waiting for
(having a TOTALLY different OBJECTIVE
THAN killing goats)
(the goats were too greedy)
B A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A H
(AFTER ALL THEY can live without beings GOATS)
NO ONE will hold their FREEDOM
up to ridicule
good morning mr. goatherd
CAN'T you (EVEN) see IT'S
MORNING I'll take pains
to believe that the NOISES AND THE BLOOD
enveloping us will give FREE REIN to a new relation
between you and me
(my hands filled with sugar
I'll never be
HUNGRY or THIRSTY)
Good morning mr. goatherd
the kid hawking the morning papers has spread
the news everywhere in town
ALREADY WE'RE STARS

(Translated by Adam J. Sorkin and Antuza Genescu)