| Bacon Sestina |
by SimonIíve gripped with trembling fingers luscious porkThe golden, tender flesh of long-banned swine Reflecting all the while upon the law Forbidding me from chewing on this fat. What hateful ancient dictum could declare A fatwa on this salty meat so crisp? Myself, Iíd best try making my thoughts crisp, With clarity proclaiming love of pork And with my greasy lips proudly declare My gratitude to tasty slaughtered swine For offering so selflessly its fat and savory self ñ there oughta be a law! Well, so there is. But Iíll defy that law And any that would bar me from this crisp Deliciousness, bestreaked with tender fat. Jehovah would not quarantine the pork, Brave product of the noble trotting swine. And this Iíll toward bright heaven now declare!  And as I scan the buffet, too, declare That flavor is its own unbending law. And so atop the pantheon go swine, Their pinkly marbled pieces done up crisp; A true apotheosis of the pork, Illuminated manuscripts of fat. All days, not just one Tuesday, should be fat, We pleasure-loving creatures now declare, With Mardi Gras beads fashioned out of pork! For chewy, crunchy lust is now my law, And never was a morning ever crisp That lacked a heaping helping of the swine. Iíll slap the face of any human swine Who asks me if I want to chew the fat But fails to serve me anything thatís crisp ó Then runs to his accountant, to declare Deductions, loss and income, per the law, Of which old Caesar makes his barreled pork. Such metaphors do insult to this pork. Let us instead heap blessings on the swine! Speak not to me of the Mosaic law; All renderings are useless, but for fat. Let skillets, with their cracklings, declare Your ban on trayf has been burned to a crisp. O noble fat! O skillet's sizzling law! Declare me but an acolyte of swine. Crisp logic fails ó all falls in thrall to pork. |