first through the ribbon

when upon grasping in the fridge

for a bottle of hot sauce

amidst the myriad of styles

collected for the taste,

her/his hand grasped hold of a

teriyaki hot sauce,

something of which s/he him/herself

thought that s/he’d created

one early eve,

upon returning from work

with a hungry stomach &

nothing but frozen potatoes to

microwave & just a little butter

to be had---

whence administering the cayenne

sauce, of which Frank’s was all

that roamed free in the vacant

box of ice,

s/he’d chosen to mix it with the soy sauce

left over from an attempt at a

Schezwan dish a few nights earlier &

in retrospect, the taste was

something that s/he swore s/he’d repeat,

given the right circumstances &

the right desire.

 

when s/he was younger &

tinkering in her/his dad’s garage, s/he

nailed two leather straps to two corresponding

planks of wood, then

slipping her booted feet in,

s/he got atop a snow hill & slid down

with her/his weight a few feet,

before falling face down in the snow

that had not yet really packed in &

alas,

s/he didn’t let the light bulb glow further,

instead, discovering with the rest of us later

that this invention would come to be known as

the “snowboard” &

that “snowboarding” would become a zillion dollar

industry---

so,

one can imagine that when s/he saw that

some company who makes hot sauces,

had already put two & two together,

mixing soy sauce with a cayenne based sauce,

s/he was quite dissatisfied to say the least &

after unscrewing the cap, licking the top to check

the taste,

the anger built up inside &

s/he him/herself felt that s/he was one step away

from smashing the bottle on the kitchen floor

in a fit of rage,

because s/he’d have to go on working the rest of

his/her life,

when joe/jen schmo would get to live out

the rest of their lives

sipping Mai Tais, greased up in coconut oil on

some beach---

but then that light bulb did kick in,

if not better late than never

&

s/he did not smash the bottle,

because after all,

it was goddamned tasty.