Friday, January 24, 2020

POT ROAST by Mark Strand

Winter is a time for hearty meals like thick soups and beef stew. This got me to thinking about one of my favorite poems: Pot Roast by Mark Strand. In his poem, a plate of pot roast brings back memories of the first time Strand tasted the meal...of his mother serving him a second helping. While everything around him seems bleak, the "power of food"...the "meat of memory" provides him with sustenance.

From POT ROAST
by Mark Strand

So I bend

to inhale
the steam that rises
from my plate, and I think
of the first time
I tasted a roast
like this.
It was years ago
in Seabright,
Nova Scotia;
my mother leaned
over my dish and filled it
and when I finished
filled it again.
I remember the gravy,
its odor of garlic and celery,
and sopping it up
with pieces of bread.

And now
I taste it again.
The meat of memory.
The meat of no change.
I raise my fork
and I eat. 

Click here to read the rest of the poem.

The Poetry Friday Roundup is at Reading to the Core this week.