A Requiem for Cooking

by Rebecca Newth

For behold you look for the dill sauce
            but it is deep in the cupboard
and lo, there is no one to help.

Had you desired it, you might have
            found another at the grocer
or crawled into the cupboard for it

that you might be pleased with the lamb
            rather than troubled
and your nose seizing up with dust;

nor should you seek from your neighbor
            for yet your own shelf–space
shall be washed clean and you shall know what is within it

whether there be dill sauce or not
ye shall know.