jonberger

Bagels are a lot to eat.
I have discovered
as wisdom in my older years,
the delicacy of croissants and lox.

I don’t care for cream cheese.
There are many white creamy substances that freak me out.
Cottage cheese, sour cream, cream cheese,
a lot of cheeses in general – white or not,
but that’s a tad off-topic –
My lox-eating is all about the fish and the bread.
The lighter bread is a better bread
and it works more easily when not toasted.

I think more people should try it
and worm their way into the bagel monopoly.
It’s time the French have their time
in the salted salmon sun!

It’s… it’s good.

The first time I ordered salad as a meal
was in DC.
I was eating with a vegetarian
so I figured, “When in Rome.”

It was at a poetry open mic,
and my vegetarian friend didn’t opt
to jump on the stage
so full reciprocity wasn’t to be had
but the salad was good.
It wasn’t an experience to be much repeated.

The second time
I ordered salad as a meal
I was eating at a salad place
so my choices were limited
but I was able to to get meat on it
so the vegan who I was trying to impress was,
to put it cooly, not.

Someday, I hope to tell you
about the third salad
I ever ordered as a meal.

Operators, stand by.


In a lovely little cafe in Brooklyn
I discovered a delicacy.
It was a light creamy mousse
I had never experienced, flavored of pistachio.
It was pricey, but well worth it.
That year, I order a mess of it for my birthday
and promptly failed to share it with anyone else.

That was all right, though. More for me!
Pistachio Mousse for me for days!

Realizing this was an expensive habit to maintain,
my mother looked into trying to home-make it
and figured out that she could replicate the recipe
basically, with big brand pudding.

I felt a little cheated,
but when I realized I could get it on demand
for a dollar a pop,
I felt like a cheater, too.

Give me that mousse, momma!

If there’s a moral here,
I guess it’s learn how to cook,
but I haven’t taken to that moral yet,
so…uh, yeah.

Some words roll off your tongue
and have psychic power
even if their meaning
means nothing to you.

I didn’t know what the fruit kumquat was
other than being in the citrus family,
but I loved its sound, and would say it
with frequency and abandon
for years.

I found the look and consistency of guacamole
distasteful. I’m still not a big fan.
But when wrestling in grade school,
I would shout “Guacamole power”
before leaping onto my enemies and friends alike.
I’d usually get my ass kicked,
but I felt empowered during the beatings.

Sometimes, people’s names work the same way.
Debbie Gibson was a name bandied about
not because I loved her music
but because of the vowels and consonants.

I just had to again look up who Seymour Hersch was
but his name is a constant source of inspiration to me,
because it sounds so very powerful.

Names hold influence. Just imagine, if you will,
if Seymour Hersch were to be making guacamole
while listening to Debbie Gibson and sucking on
a kumquat?

I shudder to think.


It was visiting BK
that got me started with my new life.
It was that simple thing
from which all else grew
the small stone that ripples
outward evermore.

My job, my apartment, my art.
my hair, all tie to that visit to BK
and a desire to taste something new.

There are always moments like this.
Thank you for being mine, BK.
I hope to enjoy you again
sometime soon.

Some days are all about the success.
Some days are sort of not.

It’s over half over, and I’m pretty sure I can call this one.

There are times when you can taste the ambrosia of victory
in every action you take
and then there are other days.
There certainly are other days.
This day will be recorded as a day going down in history, surely.

No one will ever forget this day.

I don’t know why I need to keep going on and on
about the possibilities and potential
one can swallow
– both good and bad –
within a single sunspan.
It seems obvious how much can happen
with a simple coinflip.
Like how could my day change any further?
Heads or tails?

See! I win again.

I eat better than I used tobut I still don’t eat well.
The big lesson I’ve learned
(through pills that make me learn this)
is to eat less.
I used to eat to excess
with exception frequency.

I don’t do that anymore.
The quality of my meals
is still crap
but the quantity
– that’s a lesson I’ve locked up.

It’s a sip I’ve swallowed.

I am afraid to ask
though I know
that being asked for help
brings you closer to the person asking.

If I were to ask
I’d be building bonds.
I’d be making friends.
I’d be gaining allies.

It wouldn’t be a matter of admitting weakness.
or ignorance or shame or anything else.
It’s admitting an understanding of your limits
and a willingness to collaborate.
Asking for help makes you better able to get things done.

If I say it enough
I may believe it.

When the new boss came around
I told him that the business was evil
and he asked me for proof
so I spent the day
collecting incidents
from our customers
where they felt cheated
by our byzantine
charges without permission
and without refund
and by the end of that day
I was fired.

Before then
I had a pretty sharp tongue around whatever office
I was in
and I’d hear people say
“You might wanna be careful,”
and I’d respond with,
“I have never been harmed for being honest in the office.”

What a jerk.
I keep a bit quieter now.

Of course since then
my offices
have made it a point to decentralize
so workers have less opportunity to chat.
One of the benefits of remote workers, I guess,
subtle conversations kinda disappear.

No matter.
I have much less to say.
I got no motivation to speak out
about what my company is doing.
What purpose could it serve?

But the other day,
there was this policy
that seemed like it was gonna bite us in the ass
if we don’t get proactive
and they just closed the ticket –
not important.
Let it go.

If you could be the one
to command the attention
of the center of the culture
and make him beg to break
that culture, defy it. Deny it.

If you could be the one to encourage
all forms of difference
in all sorts of people
to be mocked and questioned
and hated
for what you’ve done
for generations.

If you could be the one
to be central to the culture
by being apart from it.

You, then.
You get a ballad, too.