Work Lunch by Lee Bains is a captivating debut book of poetry that centers food as much more than sustenance – it is communication between worlds. A palimpsest of experiences and history, these poems seat us at his very specific tables and plates of food, then draw concentric circles to connect us to our own tables, our own plates, and the universal considerations of all plates. Through the journey of food, his poems portray vanishing landscapes, and what takes their place. At the same time, Bains creates a new and different lens through which to see Southerners: like his Granddaddy, in Salad, whose “…eyesight had dimmed,/” but whose “vision had grown clearer./”.
These poems give us the South as “the confluence of seasonings and knowings from/”. He showcases a melting pot that many want to, in turns, erase, co-opt, redefine in their own likeness. In Salad, Bains takes responsibility for himself and declares “…if words weren’t filled with good spirits,/charged with grace, humbled in not knowing,/they could do unspeakable horror./” – one of many lessons from his Granddaddy, who pinched and pulled to arrive at this place of himself.
Bains shares observations about how the sanitization of culture through convenience can cause us to lose the purity of dirt. He builds a bridge between past and present and somehow builds hope. Like grief – Bains speaks names to keep memories alive. These foods, the places, and people who give life to the food and allow for solidarity and humanity.
Like dough, words are “pinched and pulled” into biscuits of delicious stories. He kneads facts between Birmingham and Atlanta, economics and necessities, those who compromise/acquiesce/surrender and those who don’t, into loaves of unconditional love made from the history of an environment and the hard truths that live in the everyday of that environment. He shares ideas about how repackaged culture out-prices the people who bring that culture to life and asks: do we turn into the skid of change or curse it out and resist? The language is lyrical, accessible and brilliantly crafted.
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