“Magpie Tales” – Ping and Less Ping.
In my ongoing exploration of online writing and poetry sites, I am participating today in Magpie Tales, a site, hosted by Tess Kincaid, that sets up an interesting picture prompt. The picture was a photograph of skewered ducks hanging in a Chinese restaurant, before a slightly smiling cook. (I like to use my own art work where possible so have done my own copy of it above.)
Here’s the poem:
At a Restaurant On Mott
There is something about the Chinese,
at least when it comes to
restaurants, that does not consider
Ping (the little white duck
of my childhood who wafted
paper-lantern-like down an
unscrolled Yangtze river, among
junks of pen, ink, watercolor.)
There is something that smiles
as wide as a ladle, that
gleams with anticipatory,
and unmitigated,
satisfaction
at the sight, for example, of a chicken’s foot
streaming with small galaxies
of golden globules.
There is something that doggedly
digests the dog-eat-dogness of this
world in a way that the limp cartilage of
my vegetarian fingers simply cannot grasp;
a realism as rooted as
galic/ginger/turnips/webbed feet/hooves,
which my Ping-popping
anemia could probably profit from.
Nonetheless, I’ll stick to the tofu.
Explore posts in the same categories: iPad art, poetry, UncategorizedTags: Chinese restaurant attidtude to food poem, Magpie Tales, Magppie Tales, manicddaily, poem about picture of ducks in Chinese restaurants, vegetarian confronted with Duck
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ManicDDaily 
October 16, 2011 at 3:37 pm
I have the best memory of Captain Kangaroo reading Ping to me…lovely write…lovely art…thank you…
October 16, 2011 at 4:03 pm
Thanks, Tess.
October 16, 2011 at 4:33 pm
I get you. I see no solution. Life eats life and the divisions that center on the human species are artificial if understandable. Some of the biology writers in the last fifty years have pointed out that the planet as a whole may not view us the same as we do.
October 16, 2011 at 7:53 pm
You are so incredibly talented….. I feel so honored just to read this. “…..among junks of pen, inks, and watercolors….”
If I ever look down at a bowl of Chinese soup before me and see a chicken foot, first I am going to throw up, then I am going to think of you……..
October 16, 2011 at 8:18 pm
Ha ha! I’m honored!
October 16, 2011 at 9:16 pm
You have me looking at food in a different light… but I don’t think I can stomach tofu.
October 16, 2011 at 9:19 pm
Ha! What’s not to like!?
October 17, 2011 at 4:53 am
Some really nice lines here, “There is something that smiles
as wide as a ladle…” for instance.
October 17, 2011 at 10:19 am
I’m not a flesh eater either. There are some amazing phrases in this….I particularly like, ‘ wafted/paper-lantern-like,’ ‘something that smiles/ as wide as a ladle’ and ‘satisfaction/ at the sight, for example, of a chicken’s foot/streaming with small galaxies/of golden globules.’ Wonderful piece!
October 17, 2011 at 1:10 pm
i doubt the world wll ever give upon the live eating life…even the plant and vegetables have feelings dont they? smiles.
October 17, 2011 at 10:18 pm
Ah, Ping!
in a way that the limp cartilage of
my vegetarian fingers simply cannot grasp;
I liked this a lot. I am a meat eater but don’t really understand why, I suppose, as I love animals… I guess my meat eating fingers can’t grasp it either.
October 17, 2011 at 10:41 pm
Fine, fine work!
October 18, 2011 at 5:01 am
I remember Ping and his waddling! And there was one about brothers who could not be drowned …
Great poem and illustration.
October 18, 2011 at 10:43 am
Thanks.
October 18, 2011 at 8:42 am
Me too. I’ll stick to the tofu as well!
October 18, 2011 at 4:03 pm
I love your poem but also the sketch based on the image!
October 18, 2011 at 8:21 pm
This is charming and entertaining.
🙂
October 19, 2011 at 1:27 am
That one went quickly, and nicely… 🙂
I wonder, though… if you hadn’t met Puck, would you still like Tofu just as much?
Cheers,
Arnab Majumdar on SribbleFest.com
October 19, 2011 at 7:39 am
Ha! I’ve been a vegetarian for a very long time.
October 19, 2011 at 8:05 am
Some nice use of imagery here.
October 19, 2011 at 10:41 pm
Couldn’t find your link–I will check out your piece, thanks!