Everyone said twenty

was too many     chillies

               for one

                               recipe.
                                               I insisted,

fondle them now

through the polyester tote:

               dangerous and shiny

a jumble of soft, wonky bullets.
                                               I have decided

chillies are where

I will find beauty today.
                               Beauty is what we’re born

                               for
(Toni Morrison in my headphone)
                                                              it’s not even

a privilege or a quest.
                               Still,

my quest begins

                                               anticipating these chillies
scouring this house’s throats

after I’ve blended them with ginger

cherry tomatoes, shallots

                                               and fried the lot down

                                               to a thickness

all to bake

four fish in tomorrow

which I’ll eat with twenty friends, one

for each chilli.
                               My quest continues

with the cashier                who says wow

that’s a lot

                  of chillies.
                               To which I say    I’m making sambal

but she’s practicing Italian

with the customer next to me,
                                                              no longer interested

in my chillies.
I go questing while
agreeing with Toni,

because I need it,

because repetition makes time

                                                              seem something other

                                               than decrepit

                                                                                 self-storage.

I’ve done this

twenty eight times now:                  nothing

if not repetition.

Shouldn’t I

                  know better

than to grump at slow pedestrians

                                                              swerving

into the path I attempt

                                               the overtake in,

or weather reports

                               dispatching me to buy

chillies in pants

and a long sleeve on a day

demanding shorts?
This overheating itch and sweat

                                                              ovalling darkly

on my back is so familiar

as to be unremarkable —

                  my quest passes

                                               over it,
lands instead on chillies browning

over medium heat now the lime

juice, sugar

                  and oil have been added.
It’s easy to want more of this—

                                               elaborate preparations,

friends fawning while digging in—

                  though really I want more

of everything,

                               more! more! more!

More of my sweaty

shirt agitating me on today

of all days.           The picture of life
a birthday brings: hoops

passed smoothly through

at uniform intervals.

And between each hoop,                  a stretch, each so

                                               familiar as to be

unremarkable.
At some point the hoops, the stretches

finish up.

                               For now, beauty

quested and unquested:

                                               chillies frying,   sweat,

                               irritable in the hot street.
Though isn’t it biblical

                                               —too much so

—finding salvation in the minor

or shitty               as though god

                  happens

all the time, as though

it’s a tuning problem, as though there aint

                  no difference

                               between a seance and a school

assembly?

                               Which I believe there isn’t

and do also

                  believe there is.

Nothing needs elevating

or everything does.
                               Beauty comes at me neatly, I miss it
all the time squashing inconveniences

into something I’ve decided

                                               is its shape,

                                                              (see my sweaty shirt, my

chilli bag)

                  and that birthday image

                                                while we’re at it

                               it’s wrong, doesn’t matter
if it weren’t a hoop but an archway, a flap:

                                                we don’t ever pass thru

a thing,

                               this forked and massive world

drops on us like a branch.

Even my decision to go questing is a kind

of inexplicable crash,

                               as is this year I’m just now spinning

into.

                               I’m sorry

I got the pictures wrong,

                                                I’m sorry I went looking

for what I’d miss in the search, I’m sorry

I filled the house with spicy smoke

                                                and used the pan

that doesn’t handle acids well.
It is an absorbent

                                                pan, seasoned

with everything that’s ever been cooked,

ever will be,

                                                in it.

I hope it’s not ruined.

                                                Whatever we eat from it

has a hint now of chillies, though

                  less so each time.

                               At some point

I suppose

                  we won’t taste them

                                                at all.