Banquet Table From Apollo

Taking pains, I drove myself to near hysteria filling the menu.
Whole families, divine pantheons, would arrive, accompanied
by syncretic in-laws, siblings from all points of the compass,

droves of aunts and cousins from distant stars and heavenly bodies.
Everyone who was anyone invited themselves, and brought their guests,
filling the list, becoming a roster for endless dynasties of light.

I’d have died long ago if not for Confucius and his diligent cycling
of pills and panaceas. Even so, he cooks like a Japanese ogre,
dishes bitter as ash, flavorless as stale rice.

As Queen Mother of the Western Sky, I know what’s best
to fill the stomach with: A blend of creamy stardust
and chickpea wontons. Hot soup with noodles made

with divine flour from the very mills of heavenly vengeance!
Death himself would grow ruddy as a drunk, his starved complexion
filling out in an instant. You have my word. But this kind of work

requires centuries in advance. The garden is still tender and fruitless
from the Monkey King’s last visit, the vulgarian.
I have only myself and a thousand immortals to do the work.

So I work. Just this morning, I steamed tofu and tossed noodles
in sesame oil to release the excess water, turning fats and lipids
into solid gold. This hiss of steam and elemental energies

makes up the body of the home. Aromatic, but palpable
as the thickened air that spreads over my empire:
the kitchen of eternity flooded over in buttery light.

He knows not what I do, my jade hubby,
who walks about all day surrounded in the folds
of his own magnanimity, pompous, dignified,

out of his element a foot in the kitchen.