forward...lunCH!

Friends, I hope you're hungry, because today we are lunCHing!  Yes, the word for Day 14 of our Forward...MarCH CHallenge is "lunCH," which I am insisting on using as a verb but which is welcome in any form.

Here's my poem for today; once I got going I found lots of ways to work this.

Propositions

Said the sun-warmed mountain boulder

to the hiker on the scree,

       “Would you care to lunch on me?”

Said the hour of 12 o’clock

to the hungry retiree,

        “Would you care to lunch at me?”

Said the salty, sandy ocean

to the surfers on their knees,

        “Would you care to lunch by me?”

Said the soaring Eiffel Tower

to the petite bourgeousie,

        “Would you care to lunch near me?”

Said the dark and narrow tunnel

to the prison escapee,

       “Would you care to lunch through me?

Said the fragrant apple blossom

to the busy honey bee,

         “Would you care to lunch in me?”

Said the ever-peckish poet

to her favorite poetry,

       “Would you care to lunch with me?”

HM 2015
all rights reserved

I think that's one of my favorites so far; I hope you have something tasty packed for lunCH too!  Leave your poem in the comments or send it in an email.

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Already sitting up to the table today is Diane, who is not a picky eater (but who is a consummate information grazer):

Lunch

"The health of her family is naturally the housewife's first and greatest consideration, and as this depends so much on correct diet, it should be the aim of every housewife to plan her meals in the careful, intelligent way required to supply her household with the food each member needs."

from Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 5, by Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences [1919]

Since my household
is made up of me,
and a cat,
lunch planning
consists of opening
the refrigerator door
and seeing what has
not yet turned green.

--Diane Mayr

....and Charles, who is just nailing these small family moments over and over again.

TRAIN STATION

“Choo Choo, we’re arriving at our destination,”

I say, spooning apple sauce from its pocket

Sized plastic container, riding its contents

To the mouth of an eager lunch recipient before it

Disappears down his gullet.  Grandpa smiles,

“Is another train arriving, soon?”  He asks.

“Yes,” I say, as another Choo Choo train

Begins its journey. 

(c) Charles Waters 2015 all rights reserved.

Donna goes for the straight-up ode to our midday meal:


Lunch

As the middle link in the meal food chain
How can it really feel
sandwiched between mashed potatoes
and creamy hot oatmeal?

It's often found in a plain zippered box
and sometimes in brown bags.
What once was hot is now quite not,
and what was cold now sags.

Could ever there be a more mundane meal
than lowly pbj?
Yet still we love our midday munch.
Yea! Lunch is on its way.

©Donna JT Smith, 2015

Mary Lee writes, "We spent the afternoon yesterday at the Dayton Art Institute. They have a really excellent special exhibit of American Impressionism, organized by artists' colonies. All of the museum guards and docents looked sleepy and bored. My poem goes out to the young guard, with hopes that there is more going on than meets the eye."

MUSEUM GUARD

It's a good enough job, I guess.
I tell my friends it's dead boring,
walking around watching old ladies
who pretend to look at art
until it's time for lunch
in the museum cafe.

You don't know art
until you spend an 8-hour shift with it;
until you put in a 40-hour week
studying every brushstroke out of the corner of your eye.

In the afternoons,
couples come,
sometimes standing close,
heads bent together,
murmuring.
Sometimes one drags the other by the hand to a painting,
points,
and they laugh softly at an inside joke.

That girl stands with her nose
way too close to the Monet.
I walk by so she knows I see
but she is lost in the mystery
of light and shadow and color,
stepping forward, stepping back,
as I have done so often
when the gallery
was empty.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2015

This is a winner for me--how Mary Lee steps so wholly into the shiny shoes of the young guard, and perhaps confounds stereotypes.

Look how Kate also used a "share your lunch" refr.ain in her poem:

Sharing

I see you have
chocolate chip cookies to crunch.
Do you want to share your lunch?

I see you brought
cheese chips—a whole bunch!
Do you want to share your lunch?

I see you’ve got
a deli sub to munch.
Do you want to share your lunch?

Oh, me? I have
seed and seaweed chlorophyll bits.
Do you want a taste of it?

—Kate Coombs, 2015