I know as I create this meal
there is another cooking going on.
It, too, is all motion, all process—
an inner transformation.
Help me to give myself away
as easily as this carrot, this new potato.
I want my layers to peel away like the onion’s.
I want to be as empty and clean
as the universe in a sweet green pepper
with its white star seeds.
–Gunilla Norris, Being Home
This is a good and easy meditative piece for those of us who cook, (to stay present in a depth kind of way) and especially use a lot of onions. It enables me to remember that peeling off those unnecessary worrisome parts of me. The onions offer a natural flow of tears that come down are a form of cleansing, physically and emotionally. My maternal grandmother use to say that there was nobody to cry for the onion when she passed on. Thank you for choosing this piece.