The saddest kwetiaw
It landed on my lips with the thickness of lard
then I tasted the unpleasant surprise sweetness that
should never be for noodle soup.
I bit through a-few-minutes-to-al-dente noodles.
Even chili and vinegar could not fix the strange taste.
But it was not just the taste.
It was also the feeling.
There was no joy
of eating, of tasting, of flavors.
Gulping down the last of the pieces of spring onion leaves and shred of a chicken,
I stare at the chicken foot that was left in my bowl.
The almost cold soup felt like it was served by a widower at a funeral,
lost, now that the reason for his being has gone.
Or being alone, in solitude in a crowd.
Or someone solving the mysterious murder of someone no one cares about.
Per Alanis Morisette, “it’s meeting the man of your dreams then meeting his beautiful wife.”
What is the point?
I wanted to complain to my daughter who was obediently finishing hers.
It took all I had to keep silent lest she be influenced by what I had to say.
Before she was finished, she let out a deep sigh.
“I’m not happy with my food.”
Relief swept through me without deliverance, just bereft and spent.
An empty feeling going through as emotions were acknowledged.
As my daughter said: How can anyone mess up kwetiaw in the Land of smiles?
Comments