The Meat of the Bacon Fish
The Meat of the Bacon Fish
by shawn misener
Bacon fish meat
is the stuff of lore in the mountains
I saw the Captain Lou Albino look-alike
savoring one tiny bite after the other
from his corner table outside Beggar’s
His beard dusted with tumeric
eyes googly with intense reflection
on how wonderful it must have tasted
I sat three tables down
asked for what he was having
but the hunched old lady leaned in
and said that he had gotten the only bacon fish of the day
I ordered blackened Tilapia instead
and mused over purple soda as the sun bent into an oval
and dug into the blue hills
this is beautiful
I’m not quite sure what to say this. It isn’t great. It isn’t bad. But it does have a nice flow.
Funny what we settle for sometimes in life…and how the sap always makes out lucky. Tumeric is a cheap alternative to saffron, I am told, as is Tilapia for Bacon Fish Meat. I enjoyed the read, now if we could just get a Cyndi Lauper song and wrestling match to go along with Captain Lou Albano. Last stanza i liked best with personification and ‘ho-hum’ resignation to that short-end-of-stick we often get in life’s game. Thanks for sharing! P.S. I’ll take some Long John Silver’s Fish and Chicken if the Bacon Fish Meat is all out!
I see the makings of a much better poem here. Fewer, more carefully chosen words would be a good start. Remove words like “googly” and lines like “…and said that he had gotten”…that just doesn’t work well. More economy with the words, different words, and maybe some line break changes and this could be a 10.
I’ll settle for this blackened TIlipia.
Thanks for the comments. This could be better in a lot of ways. It was kind of a quicky slam-write when I mistook my wife talking about baking fish for bacon fish. I like it, though. It creates a mood in me, and yes, I have changed some words, but “googly” is not one of them. I love that word, I use it a lot, it’s part of my repitiore of repeated rants, along with “glistening” “neon” and some other ones I can’t remember right now.