Attitudes - W. Ross Winterowd

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      Invited out to dine last night,

      We’d have gladly taken flight;

      As guests, we had no alibis

      And met Pale Tuber in disguise,

      Posing as a salad green,

      The worst imposture we have seen.

      Legumes

      On the vine, it rises high,

      Its goal the vastness of the sky.

      Secure within its cunning pod,

      It soars beyond the earthy sod.

      In the ether there with Jack,

      It never dreamed of coming back.

      The pea—who ever would have thought

      It longed to be an astronaut.

      In a row by one another,

      Sister pea and legume brother,

      Secure against the force of G’s,

      In their capsule quite at ease,

      Had no inkling that their fate

      Was actually a dinner plate.

      Since soy bean is a bricoleur,

      The handyman without a peer,

      When we say “soya” in our house,

      We always think of Lévi-Strauss.

      Fermented juice of soy’s a sauce

      That saves our rice from total loss

      Though honestly I must confess

      I think tofu’s a tasteless mess.

      My farmer friend, I swear, avows

      The soybean nourishes his cows.

      This legume, whether cooked or raw,

      Preoccupies Jacques Derrida.

      John Kenneth Bean is enigmatic.

      With wieners he is democratic,

      And yet in Julia’s cassoulet

      He turns elitist, slightly fey.

      His pronouncements economic

      Seem to me a little comic

      When with sombrero and guitar

      In chili he becomes a star.

      With eloquence he makes us humble.

      We listen as our stomachs rumble,

      Sitting stiff, in mortal terror

      Of that most disgraceful error.

      Professor Twist’s Last Expedition

      Ogden Nash’s exposition

      Chronicled the expedition

      To the land of crocodile,

      The upper reaches of the Nile.

      I give you now Professor Twist,

      A conscientious scientist.

      Trustees exclaimed, “He never bungles!”

      And sent him off to distant jungles.

      Camped on a tropic riverside,

      One day he missed his loving bride.

      She had, the guide informed him later,

      Been eaten by an alligator.

      Professor Twist could not but smile.

      “You mean,” he said, “a crocodile.”

      That was in . . . uh . . . let me see,

      The year of nineteen twenty-three.

      In thirty-three he set out on

      A journey up the Amazon.

      After hardship you can’t describe,

      He came upon a savage tribe,

      Healthy, happy, without disease—

      Twist barely reached up to their knees.

      Eagerly he told their chief,

      “Your followers defy belief.

      They get their vigor by what means?”

      The chief replied, “We eat-um beans.”

      “Beans? Beans? What kind?” Poor Twist was wild.

      “Yooman beans!” The chief just smiled.

      Grain

      On a frosty winter morn,

      I have my choice: oats, wheat, or corn.

      In March when all the ways are slush,

      I choose to start my day with mush.

      Cracked wheat is hearty and nutritious;

      Corn meal is soothing and delicious;

      But oatmeal laced with heavy cream

      And honey globs has my esteem.

      You see, in German my name, “Ross,”

      Means “stallion.” (You can call me “Hoss.”)

      When offered oats at break of day,

      We prancing kind just can’t say, “Neigh!”

      When as a child I walked from school,

      Wading through the pool on pool

      Of fallen leaves along the way

      On lawn and sidewalk where they lay

      And heard their rustle and their crunch,

      (Three hours ago I’d downed my lunch),

      I sniffed the air, a very hound,

      Alert to every smell and sound,

      The musty odor of the mums,

      The chuffing engine’s distant drums,

      And saw ripe apples hanging late,

      Too high for me to depredate.

      A block from home, I pause, I freeze.

      The smell of bread is on the breeze.

      I clasp my “Dick and Jane” securely,

      For I understand most surely

      That wheat when ground is more than flour:

      It’s endowed with mystic power.

      Baking bread in Bombay, Rome,

      Or Salt Lake City signals “home.”

      You can serve it slice by slice.

      You can pour it over ice.

      It goes well with ham or soda,

      Vermouth, corned beef, bitters, gouda.

      Loaf or bottle, worth a try.

      With rye you’ll never go awry.

      “I wouldn’t leave Beijing,” said Mao,

      “For all the rice in Sacramento.”

      You see, the Chairman clearly knew

      A fact

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