If I Never Meet My Soulmate (Allen Miguel Bamba)

This was inspired by Laurence Alma - Tadema 's If No One Ever Marries Me which I discovered when I watched Natalie Merchant 's beautiful rendition of the poem into a song. Enjoy! :)

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If I never meet my soulmate-
And I don't know why I should,
For there is no such thing as fate,
And that idea is just so crude-

If I never meet my soulmate
I wouldn't care very much;
I shall get a songbird in a cage,
And make sure it has a strong latch,

I shall have a hut near the sea
And a dog all my own,
And a little garden with bees
Decorated with shiny black stones,

And when I'm really getting old, -
At fourty eight or nine -
I shall help others meet theirs
Since I haven't met mine.

The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister

This is the first novel of Erica Bauermeister that I have ever read. First times normally means no expectations for me and boy was I surprised with the way she cooked a full course meal of people's lives beautifully interwoven with the feel, smell, sight and of course, the taste, of food.

This delightful novel is the story of the magical or shall I say mouth watering cooking lessons taught by Lillian who fell in love with food when she was young but initially used it as a means to rebel. Her students are varied like the ingredients she uses; Carl and Helen are a married couple that exudes marital bliss but really went through struggles of their own; Chloe, busses tables and lives in with her boyfriend who she used to work with before; Antonia, olive skinned and has that sexy accent works designs kitchens and adapts to her new life in America; Tom, overturned with sorrow and grief for what he lost; Ian, the software engineer who discovered a whole new world of life in his taste buds;and Isabelle, the gray haired lady dealing with memory lost and those she still has.

The School of Essential Ingredients paints an exquisite picture of how food can change lives for the better. That sometimes cooking is not merely a task but an adventure to a world unknown, to our inner self, to memories lost, found, and created.

4 STARS 

Saffron

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Your whispers are

pieces of Saffron from

a faraway land

- exotic and expensive.

It delights me

when they come

unexpected in the 

quiet blur of the bleak night;

Warming me up like no other

sound can;

It keeps me safe from a world

yearning for spices because I know

I can always get it from you.

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*Picture from tastewiththeeyes.com

Blinded

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I opened my eyes

so fast that I got

momentarily blinded by the sun;

It pierced right through me,

stunning me for an instant;

a pinch of eternity already lost

in time and with no chance of retrieval;

I wondered if I better go slow next time

and really take my time,

step by step,

 and not rush things

With life, love and 

with you.

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*Picture from picturesofthesun.net