House, Garden, Madness by Cate Marvin - Sweet Potato Soufflé Recipe

House, Garden, Madness
By Cate Marvin

Meeting his mouth made it so I had house again.
I called him garden and drew him so, grew
his long lashes like grasses so I could comb
them with my stare. Some evenings a low cloud
would arrive, hang its anxiety over the yard.

Having his mouth at mine again gave me back
home. The walls painted themselves blue
flowers grew larger than my head, stared
at me with wide eyes through the windows.
I was surrounded. A cloud stretched gray arms.

His mouth and mine again built something back
up with heat. The house was home again, wherever
I lived. The flowers grew fat, fed on weeds
around them. Ladybugs tucked their red luck
beneath petals' chins. The cloud came home again.

His eyes were closed but mine kept swinging open.
I saw him in the garden, surrounded by its light.
The flowers cut their own stalks, handed themselves
over to him in bunches. He kissed their bouquets,
and petals raptured. A cloud lowered, dark with fury.

I pressed my mouth to palm, closed my eyes
to find the garden, then saw: window shut in fright,
roots drowned, flower stalks broken, their heads dead
in puddles. Startled, I looked around. The cloud
descended, prepared to hemorrhage in my arms.

From: "Poetry Daily", page 173
first published in The Paris Review, no. 158, Spring, Summer 2001
also from "World's Tallest Disaster" by Cate Marvin

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Madness is highly underrated.

I'd like to share my favorite, most requested Thanksgiving recipe passed down to me by my Mama.  As most Southern cooks do, I add or subtract spices to suit my taste.  (We're the best cooks in the world down here in Swamp country.) It tastes like a dessert, but it's a yummy side dish, best served with deep fried turkey, cornbread dressing, giblet gravy, homemade rolls and green bean casserole.  Oh, and don't forget the cranberry sauce.

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with love, family and friends.  Ray & I are alone this year, sadly... :-(

Love & Blessings to you all,

~Marion

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Mama's Sweet Potato Soufflé

3 cups mashed sweet potatoes (I used canned yams, but you can use fresh)
1 cup sugar (or Splenda, a sugar substitute)
2 eggs
1 Tablespoon vanilla
1 teaspoon of cinnamon  (you can also add nutmeg if you like)
1/2 teaspoon cardamom (my secret ingredient)
½ cup butter, melted

Mix the above ingredients well using hand mixer and pour into oven-safe casserole dish.

TOPPING:  (mix in separate bowl)

1 cup packed brown sugar (or Splenda Brown Sugar)
1/3 cup flour
1 cup finely chopped pecans (or walnuts)
1/3 cup butter

Melt butter in mircrowave.  Mix all topping ingredients together with a fork. It will be crumbly. Sprinkle mixture evenly over top of casserole mixture. Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees or until golden brown on top.  Enjoy!!!

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"The Pilgrims made seven times more graves than huts. No Americans have been more impoverished than these who, nevertheless, set aside a day of thanksgiving." ~H.U. Westermayer

*****

For each new morning with its light,
For rest and shelter of the night,
For health and food, for love and friends,
For everything Thy goodness sends.  ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

*****

"Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence." ~Erma Bombeck

*****

"O Lord that lends me life,
Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness."  ~William Shakespeare

*****

Indigo Dreams by Marion

Indigo Dreams

By Marion Lawless

Purple Kale

Purple glass

Grape.

                  Indigo

                                   Indigo book---

                                   Indigo kitchen stools---

                                   Indigo mystery.

I drank Purple Russian Kale

in my plastic purple glass

and it transmogrified into

a misty, holy, Russian Mass

in a huge psychedelic cathedral with

melting stained glass windows.

                               ---imagiNATION

Modigliani was a poet;

his medium was paint on canvas.

He loved long-necked women

and Absinthe---green liquor

that took him to dream worlds---

Dearest poet, I love you the way 

purple loves the elusive indigo,

the way paint lusts for canvas and

the way words and ink crave paper...

the way my fingers love

the feel of dirt as I plant

eggplants and tomatoes.

I dream of touching your skin

the way sunlight caresses

the tips of the trees...

I think of your dark, long hair

tangled in a soft morning breeze,

your face upturned as words

come to you---pure & unfiltered.

I wake, 

eager to read them.

Marion L.

5/17/17

I Envy My Dolls

Inga Rose from Moscow, Russia

WORDS ARE THE DIMINUTION OF ALL THINGS
By. Charles Wright

The brief secrets are still here,
and the light has come back.
The word remember touches my hand,
But I shake it off and watch the turkey buzzards bank and wheel
Against the occluded sky.
All of the little names sink down,
weighted with what is invisible,
But no one will utter them, no one will smooth their rumpled hair. 

There isn’t much time, in any case.
There isn’t much left to talk about
as the year deflates.
There isn’t a lot to add.
Road-worn, December-colored, they cluster like unattractive angels
Wherever a thing appears,
Crisp and unspoken, unspeakable
in their mute and glittering garb.

All afternoon the clouds have been sliding toward us
out of the
Blue Ridge.
All afternoon the leaves have scuttled
Across the sidewalk and driveway, clicking their clattery claws.
And now the evening is over us,
Small slices of silence
running under a dark rain,
Wrapped in a larger.

——————————

My dissolving, brittle skeleton,
a pain-filled coat rack
for decaying flesh.
I envy my plastic dolls. ~Marion, 11/6/2019

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