Merry Christmas to all my Red Room Friends!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5g4lY8Y3eoo

Boleybeg Christmas

Blinis (Buckwheat) for Breakfast

Milk is sour so Baileys has to do for coffee

the smell of cloved ham frying in the pan

birds swoop on oatmeal scattered on the lawn

and I scold bare-footed sons with sleep in their eyes

so be-dazzled by baubles from the moon that hangs in the clouded sky

that the icy floor does not even penetrate where they have come -

Scrabble and all my letters vowels

and smoked salmon on my mind -

capers and avocados, slivers of anchovies

Flat Bread with Rosemary from Piedmont

and a bowl of tangerines  spin in my mind

Roast turkey drenches the room stuffed with mother's

dressing - rich with butter, thyme, sage, parsley

and bacon steeped in cider and juice and clove and plums

awaits the unveiling

The sun is way too big on this day and the sight too brilliant

and all of the sun is in the fireplace that warms two dogs by its

side

and the letters scramble on the table, no one has put them away -

they lay there like broken words that must mean something and yet

there is still so much to come of this day that all my sentences must meld 

together, must convey, must matter like sauce in a pan thickening with each

stir, each time the wood on the spoon wears down just a little, just without

even anyone noticing.