What's Cooking?

CORN CABBAGE SUMMER SOUP

1 1/2 cups of chopped chicken
1 small onion diced
1 Pablano Pepper diced
1/2 head of red cabbage diced
2 habenero peppers finely chopped
1 can of white hominy (drained)
Several chopped pole beans (for texture)

cook in thin layer of olive oil with
plenty of fresh garlic
add chicken or vegetable stock (2 cans
for larger portions)
season with mexican oregeno and sweet basil
simmer for about an hour
add fresh cilantro at serving

-vikingo
tastes great with a cold bottle of
Modelo Especial!
HEY FRIARS... IF YOU GOTS THE NOTION
ADD A RECIPE TO THIS POST... IT CAN
BE A RECIPE FOR FOOD, DRINKS, FUN OR
LOVE!

Sounds great vik. For those of you who mate I recommend terere:

Terere

prepare cold water with ice,
the thermos will keep it icy
squeeze limes or lemons into the water
use the water to make the mate.
it's wonderous on sultry days.

l'a-ro

25 July--pictorial.

saw a sign for a cantorial soloist, besides solipsism and hermunculus--this came infront of my camera:









and one from a bit ago:

smoldering earth

Hands out to Chivo--
his Grandfather past this week.
He is back in New York;
as he says, “grieving and celebrating life.”

from
muck earth
and hard cider
to the erie canal
low bridge
everybody down

peace and love

For Matthew Ernest Testolin, on the anniversary of his birth

First, I wish to extend a special thanks to my friend, Joel. I don’t believe that I took the time to thank him proper for his poem, and extending a hand during a time of great pain and confusion. The days we spend crossing paths with loved ones and strangers not ever knowing fully where on the road we stand or move can be at once daunting and awe inspiring. I guess when we do brush past one another all we need to do is be fully present, and give ourselves entirely to that moment. What else do we have? Anyway, thank you, friend. It was my honor to eulogize my nephew at his memorial service. Finding words to justly honor a life is a scary endeavor. You don’t want to fuck it up. The night before I had no idea what to say, how to form my feelings, not a clue. I began paging through some books, reaching. I picked up a book that was given to me years ago by a friend, “The Fisherman’s Guide To Life”, and opened to a passage that read: “If the fish don’t want to bite, let them not be caught.” So I went to bed. The next morning I woke and went for a walk. Over a bowl of cereal and a cup of coffee I wrote the poem below for Matt, and read it later that morning at his memorial service. Matthew died on July 4, 2006 at 29 years of age, two weeks shy of his 30th birthday. He fathered four children and had a fiancé all of whom he enjoyed camping and fishing with. He was a hunter, and was no stranger to the ways of the wild. He had problems, show me one among us that doesn’t, but everything Matthew ever did was out of love or wanting to be loved. There will never be anything so beautiful as someone who wants to be loved. And Matthew was beautiful. The last time I saw Matt was at his sons’ soccer games, a couple weeks before he passed. I sat next to him for the match and we shared what was to be our last conversation in this life. We talked mostly about how he was doing. He said he thought he finally found a job that he was good at, and that he really enjoyed, as a plumber’s apprentice. I told him that it was probably in his blood; my mother’s dad was a plumber. We had a great day, and the last thing Matt said to me was “See you in Oscoda”. Matthew, less than seven years younger than me, was not just my nephew; he was my brother. Today, July 18, 2006, Matthew would have been 30 years old. So as I get ready to head north to Oscoda on Saturday, as is the rest of the Hawkinson / Testolin / Premier clan, we will carry with us his memory, of his laughter, his beautiful heart and his courageous passage through this world of form. Eternal rest be granted unto you, my brother, and may perpetual light shine upon you.

Love, Your Brother, John


Oscoda Sky
(For Matthew)

Walk down to the lake
And cast out your line
Morning cools and breaks into a blue
Through the outstretched arms of the White Pine
As you pitch your tent on the shore
Throwing the Petoskey Stone and making it skip
With sand-coated knees, the dunes behind us
Wade out into the soft currents
For laughter colors the Oscoda sky
Eternal canopy of light, falls onto
Gracing the skin, glow
Like your children
Dancing on your shoulders
You are with the one’s you love now
Brother
Now
And forever

More Waters

a second round of water pomes was started by the Hawk...
here is his and my response... L-aro-- please add yours as well (added)
--vikingo


The Roils and the Secret

I've kept her secret long enough now

I am home better a week
And all it has done is rain
A mighty fine welcome back, indeed

Always telling me to go
This city
As I watch the freighters drift by, from the Isle that was Belle

The minister from the Old Mariner's church is dead
Passed in his sleep
there are no more great shipwrecks

This damn weather system
Hangs over me
My Michigan and the Lake

The steelheads have all come ashore
Last night, I sat with one, on a piece of driftwood, next to the Grand Haven Pier
Shared some conversation, fish stories, and a smoke

I've kept her secret long enough now

None of us can let go of it
Escape her
Move beyond her shores, to the sand

Arching towards the water
The ancient cliffs, glacial till
Reach over our shoulders, under the canopy of night

We are so far behind ourselves
By the time we see its light
The star is already dead

The storm gathers again
Over the lake, blowing sparks from our beach fire
Clouds mountain on the horizon

As we stare out into the waters
Throwing the Petoskey Stone as far as we can into her hem
Casting it, a hundred years out, the old man is in my ear

The future is not so far off

***************************************************





i've got solid oak beneath my soles
it bucks and bends to the rhythms
i don't remember where
the sea ends and my skin begins

the sun has been a father, a mother
a lover, and a thief of all i possess
and she sends her rain and wind
to play for my folly and my fortune

i've tried several times
to hang myself in the heavy clouds
but they never take my weight
and i wake back on water washed wood

i am rooted here at the great wheel
count the rings inside my limbs
brush the leaves sprouting from my skull
feel the bark covering my heartbreak

it has been 17 years 2 weeks and 1 day
since i saw my home and love
there are no more great shipwrecks
but this one will be glorious

***************************************************



the warm breathing is as far as shore
the seed of desperate longing
to mingle distinct and correct.

willow and her hair
streak electric, her eyes
consuming lampposts as i row
a stranger to my hands
towards the sound of the saturated earth.

i came from the deep
slipping through the ribbing of a sunken queen
gliding over the floor
hungry hunger burning
i mean
i wept as I bailed.

onto the sturdy earth
i climb out over the bow rope in hand
but let it fall back into the inky water
a meek sinking crease.

the empty boat bobs away
is watched.

the sky's where the moon used to be

camp’s been broken
pierced by my approach.

it was from where
the not now stars

they've portaged
and i can’t match their speed.

talking about the travelling hot pork pot blues
on an onion roll while knocking back a stella
in the sun, umbrella'd by the bar roof while frogs
and dagos kicked it out for supremecy and a song
repeated in my skull alls i can say is:
i have such great love for humanity and all its calamity
the friars are well met in joo-lie and again i say:
viva el chivo
viva la-ro
viva pirata
& peace in the middle east

--vikingo