Hawai’i Pacific Review, 2006

 

First he showed him how to hold the cleaver,
where to make the best cut,
said to keep his eye on the meat’s grain,
hold the blade steady,
and how beautifully the meat opened
on the maple chopping block,
gracious host to its own body,
the apprentice wiping his bloodied hands
across his heavy cotton apron;
his sigh, such finesse,
a sigh a lover might make,
satisfied before ultimate
pleasure—but, no climax here,
only the calm of knowing

one did the other body right,
and can’t you tell
that the one being trained
seeks the best advice to finish meat,
especially since fine butchery is nearly extinct,

for why else
would the Master train
the hand coming back to fingers,
to opening, carefully at first,
the red flesh that was once desire.