“Dispatch from the Midwest Cook-Off, June 2023” and “Key Foods”

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Dispatch From the Midwest Cook-Off, June 2023

I am awakened by a smell, sweet and smoked. Clouds brisketed above the lake. Startled and unsure, I close the windows. Check first on the children. Second on the weather to find the warning for today is…BETTER TO NOT LEAVE, BUT IF YOU MUST – DON’T BREATHE     We are told to stay indoors because there is a fire in another country. What is the purpose of borders if we are all subject to the smoke… It has been years of masking inside. Now, we must mask outside. Maybe I will sew the mask to my face. A permanent filter for the machine that I am. Line it with a one dollar bill. So that I can smell my worth. Which is a punctured hot dog on the end of a stick? Blistering in the choices of a world I just met. We are meat on a stick. Being held too close to what will consume us. At the carnival of our ending. I could equate this suffocated city to Hell. But this scene doesn’t feel theatrical enough. There isn’t enough screaming to sell it. And what good is a tragedy that doesn’t buy you some flame. I mean fame. 

Key Foods

For Puerto Rico + Palestine

The corner 

store up 

                 the block

The One

that serves 

      alcapurrias 

and pernil sandwiches 

is still there.

The One 

that has

  Boricua shit everywhere

is still there. 

But it’s owned by Palestinians now

& it’s crazzzzy 

cause the food still

tastes Boricua made

[I guess after

awhile stolen

land all tastes

the same]