Beltane: The Song of Songs

The invitation read:

“What’s up May Day witches! You know I love a good theme.

Tomorrow night we celebrate the eve of May Day...there is a lot of beautiful and ancient poetry and tradition around this holiday...the first day of summer, fertility, youth, sexuality, sunshine! Thanks for coming over and celebrating with me!

Wickerman 1973 is going to be fun!!!!

To make the experience even more enchanting I recommend rubbing perfume or an essential oil of your choice or even the petals of a rose between your bosom and thanking the gods for your health, youth and beauty!

Decorate yourself in the cloths and jewels that make you feel like your most May Queen self!

Bring with you a nectar of your choosing to share.

I will light the candles, prepare the snacks, and I can’t wait to see you!

Natasha”

The poem I wrote the next day:

On the feast of Saint Walpurga we gathered in our wedding dresses

We ate the olives and the grapes leaves

The cucumbers and the holy bread

The parsley and the yogurt and the poetry

Our hairs flowed down like flocks of goats

Our thighs curved like ornaments

Our breasts like eight fawns

Our eyes eight doves

Our twenty fingers held the knife that cut through our cake of cardamom

After the flame was lit

By the body of a beetle

inside the petals of a rose

Surrounded by Frankincense and myrrh

With a pinch of salt and a vile of bitter seed we blessed ourselves with anointing oils and laughed.

In-between sips of wormwood and pomegranates and the notes of an Oud

We watched the willow dance naked at our door.

PASTA a la Jackson Pollock

Here begins an obsession…I have discovered a delicious and easy way to make pasta a la Jackson Pollock. I think my favorite thing about this recipe that I have utilized dozens of times in my own pasta variations is the tomato paste technique. Simply throwing a whole can of tomato paste in and then filling it with water and throwing that in too, so simple so easy..and a very tasty technique for creating a think and rich sauce. I don’t think this looks anything like what it is supposed to perhaps…but that’s not the point now is it?

INGREDIENTS

• 2 tablespoons olive oil

• 1 onion, finely chopped

• 1 pound pork tenderloin or pork chops, finely cut by hand

• 1/2 pound mushrooms, sliced

• 6-ounce can tomato paste

• 1 can water

• 1 bay leaf

• Salt and pepper, to taste

• 1 pound spaghetti

• 1 cup parmesan cheese, grated, for serving

INSTRUCTIONS

1. In a heavy-bottom skillet, heat the oil and brown the onion. Add meat, mushrooms, tomato paste, water, and seasonings; cover and simmer 30 minutes or until pork is tender.

2. Meanwhile, cook spaghetti in salted boiling water 8-10 minutes; drain.

3. Toss spaghetti with sauce, and serve with cheese.

Feast for Poets

The Hound of Heaven by Francis Thompson is a beautiful, moving, spiritual poem that I stumbled upon when I was doing my research behind Kate Bush’s track Hounds of Love. Who knows if this poem was an actual inspiration for her. Part of me believes it to be true…or perhaps…like so many magical things…these ideas from heaven transpire again and again and transcend space and time and all the boundaries. Reminding us through the artists and the poets and the singers, what it is we all have been searching for…

Perhaps it was the desire to elevate my language, to memorize something beside song lyrics and passwords, another kind of poetry, to practice the art of memorization…or whatever. The point is…I set out to memorize this entire poem. In the process, as the days went on, and the poem got longer in my brain, I felt the great desire to share this accomplishment and this beautiful poem with others. So a feast of poets and for poets was born.

My partner in theme dinners, Talia Ceravolo, prepared a delicious Pakistani curry, there was Tabouli and various other Lebanese mezze. Around the table everyone stood up and read their poems aloud. And for dessert we ate a delicious Pistachio cake by Talia with Rose Water cream and I recited, by memory, the Hounds of Heaven in it’s entirety with Batya MacAdam-Somer accompanying me on violin.

Habibi Disco: Do You Love Me?

For my 33rd birthday I brought back ten Fez hats “tarboosh” from Byblos. Meesh travelled with me to Lebanon and met Teta. The first day Nina met me and found my fez collection scattered on the floor of my room, she told me she loved me.

The inspiration for this nostalgic feast was simple…music. The sounds of Middle Eastern and North African disco from the 70’s. The pre-war Beirut nights of jiggling mustaches, endless arak and tabouli synths.

Chad Farran (with Lebanese blood), Dusty Brough, Ricky Giordano and myself created a band for the night and played a set of Lebanese and middle eastern classics from the midcentury to present day. Talia Ceravolo, donned an old Bob Ross halloween costume, glued on a couple extra chest hairs and delivered a sensational and unforgettable performance of “Do you Love me?” by the Bendaly Family. The original video is worth a look here.

I will look back fondly on this evening, when we were all together, traveling back in time…to a place I love and so desperately wish to know better. Celeste, the visionary that she is, captured the mood perfectly in this little short featuring the one and only Jonny Alexander, who always shows up in 200% in theme as the life of the party.

West Indian Folk Dinner

The dress code was Ernest Hemingway meets Wide Sargasso Sea. With the help of friends, I baked my great grandmother’s recipe for Achee Quiche. The rest of the food I don’t quite remember. But the dessert I’ll never forget. Another family recipe, my grandmother’s Coconut Jello. So good…I believe more than one song was written about it that night.

Around the table we wrote and recited exquisite corpse poetry, laughed and drank rum.

In the drawing room, amidst the glow of candle light, I sang folk songs from Cayman Islands with Aunt Julia Hydes picture an altar at the front of my keyboard.

I told the tale of the cassava cake, the tiger, monkey and anansi.

“It was raining…heavy the rain come down. Anansi, sat in his window…”

We jiggled coconut jello in our mouths and that night in the midnight hours, I sang about your guava eyes and Talia weaved rhyme with me.

The next day we filmed in the after glow of a glorious tropical and the scent of ripe fruit.

“Split me open…with devotion”