"bourdain" poems
“Completely under the impression she would resume her status outside” he thought..
maybe my own words betrayed me as the knife entered Brutus
Unhinged,
could the mind play a game, it saw the movies but did it Saw 5?
Animals huddled around the man made entry salivating at the idea of another chance,
ravenous they paced hungry for a sole sight
What could be for dinner?
If an appearance not made would both beings have to consider drastic measures. A voyage? A continental trip to parts unknown? Meeting ghosts are not my style but Anthony Bourdain was surely welcome.
Was that a twitch from the ****
all beings in the area stood at attention awaiting a response from the opening. Informal gestures and gazing eyes they dampen any doubts of their desires.
“How dare they keep us waiting”
the impatient thoughts arose out of the sandy concrete mixture. Those who knew of the situation stood steadfast and steady — this might be it
No “read” stamp,
hope has begun to dwindle.
I too wished of a different outcome but life demands transitions.
Aug 11, 2022
Aug 11, 2022 at 11:44 PM UTC
marijuana, fourth of july,
and even then
that anthony bourdain look in your eye
never did know
how much i could relate
and that’s what i do these days,
i relate and relate
soon it will be time to remember
you'll be gone four years already,
and i've lived the kind of life
that knows better than to face you
around or gone four years already
Jul 5, 2018
Jul 5, 2018 at 3:26 AM UTC
The Chef
As the Bourdain said a cook is nobody
he has no power no one cares what he has to say
some of them are gifted with a natural talent for food and its ingredient
and flashes of inspiration can fire the spark that is godlike.
I knew of a restaurant which was always full at lunch and dinner,
Where the chef? I asked a waiter. Oh, he is somewhere in the back.
Back of the food place an open door, the chef stood to smoke
a cigarette. I looked at me sourly, but when I expressed
interest and when an order came in of a bacon omelette
he made it with the flourish of a craftsman.
The manager of the establishment said the chef had worked here for
Six years but he- the chef- was impossible to work with.
The chef suddenly quit and drove a taxi. Less stress that way.
The restaurant faltered until the penny dropped, a chef is a star
In the firmament of catering without a flawed genius in the kitchen, it is better
to run a pizza parlour
Sep 1, 2018
Sep 1, 2018 at 4:46 AM UTC
How do you describe
I'm not sure that you can
Truly find the words for
A Renaissance Man
I woke up this morning
Saw the paper, he was dead
Renaissance Man
Popped into my head
Rebel against the standard
Rage not causing pain
Live a life worth living
Like Anthony Bourdain
Teacher, writer, critic
Chef, student and man
Philosopher and cleric
A grown up Peter Pan
Question those around you
Learn, and share the wealth
Be a Renaissance Man to others
Don't keep your knowledge on the shelf
Demons, we all have them
Don't feed them, for they breed
Doubt into existence
Dark demons need to feed
Live life, avoid the shadows
Share and then go share again
Don't end up on a headline
Fight the urge, count to ten
Today, I read a headline
A Renaissance Man out of pain
I guess we never really knew him
Rest gentle Sir Boudain
Jun 9, 2018
Jun 9, 2018 at 3:44 PM UTC
Bless me Padre for I have sinned
My last confession was 3 poems ago
Padre, I watch **** food ****
Lamb shank in a garlic fennel sauce
Pig parts unknown wrapped in bacon
Tri-tip and tripe marinated in marrow
Padre, I eat my veggies
(caramelized broccoli florets in a Béarnaise sauce)
But **** that man Bourdain!
Again and again and again!
I find myself drawn to pork stewing
In decadent assorted sweet-meats
Padre, I need a chlorophyll cleanse
Please accept my humble supplication…
What? Three kale martinis and one cauliflower?
I repent! Let the cleanse begin!
Jan 2, 2019
Jan 2, 2019 at 11:02 AM UTC
THE MIND OF A CHEF
Can scare you to death,
THE LAY OVER cancelled
Anthony left,
He was always gone,
He worked on vacation,
A COOKS TOUR,
NO RESERVATIONS,
He said that he had no regret,
Thru the sinewy smoke of his cigarette,
and still he left us eating crow,
keeping a secret,
PARTS UNKNOWN,
He's gone again,
his choice,
his fault,
Clearing the table,
I spill the salt,
Unlucky,
******
I don’t understand
The flavor is gone,
Everything’s bland
©B L Costello 2018
Jun 9, 2018
Jun 9, 2018 at 9:04 PM UTC
Watching old Anthony Bourdain
and I hope the uneaten food gets donated to his staff
like how the great feasts of young King Henry VIII
got thrown to poor, after He had a bite or two
of foie gras done 12 ways
Never mind
After all that's happened
Tony should be beatified
I remember laying on the floor of my parent's room
when I couldn't get to sleep in middle school
and we'd watch a back to back block of No Reservations
on a 13 inch box TV on their nightstand
The next thing we knew, people grew more open for a time
Wegmans' got sushi, and Dad loves it
The parents weren't so ashamed of the city they fled to the 'burbs from, just for a second
Took them to a bespoke restaurant during pride month
and they thought it was a gay bar
just because they flew a rainbow flag out front
They grew to welcome it
for a few years at least
Thanks Tony
Wish you were here
and I had more to say about that
than a ******* postcard script
Your voice is still echoed in my house
on an endless nightmare streaming channel
kept on mostly for my chiweenie
You'd be horrified, but
still I know your take
could help reinvigorate our hope in a connected world today
Jul 10, 2025
Jul 10, 2025 at 4:35 PM UTC
Kate ***** and Anthony Bourdain
both beloved affluential cognoscenti,
(took their life via cerebral hypoxia)
neither death can one explain
left family and friends to speculate
without lapsing into speculation
impossible knot
to veer off toward inane,
where fame nor fortune no immunity
against unbeknownst
deathly accursed mental illness
impact their adherents
plus affect large swath
of population in the main
cuz, (strictly my opinion)
the tightly woven
world wide web doth plain
lee meld humanity linkedin
by avast societal reign
forcing the global community to train
energies toward heightened
awareness (yes in vain)
for those who tightened noose around neck
as grief doth wax and wane
no doubt less prominant persons
amidst every walk
of life give admittance
to grim reaper, who doth stalk
every mortal being tempting surrender soul
for eternal peace, where soul asylum
sacrifice forsaken to black hawk
swooping down soundlessly
to ****** priceless human life
subsequently, whence
benumbed onlookers gawk
aware how precarious, riotous, and tenuous
the psyche offers no resistance,
nor doth balk
at absent awareness,
how collective adoration wears
a funereally ghostly, horribly immensely
joylessly knitted veil
eludes measurement, though nonetheless
unanimity that far reaching sadness
weighs heavy on tear filled side of scale
witnessed by grievous next of kin,
who struggle to accept severe de rail
ment of unsuspecting hidden agony im pail
ling corporeal flesh gouging body electric
on par with a nine inch nail
jaggedly renting asunder (an unseen male
strum) pitching one incognito,
no matter she/he appears hearty and hale
leaving a wake of inconsolable paroxysms
causing thee human league to ail!
Jun 8, 2018
Jun 8, 2018 at 9:47 PM UTC
No reservations, no known points, no fish on Mondays,
no more warthog ****** or fermented shark,
nothing but kitchen omerta out the steamy back-alley backdoor,
nothing but adventure, exploration, basic human decency.
Nothing but grace and love and travel,
nothing but a steaming *** full of public love in the end,
nothing but leather and curiosity,
nothing but a hot bowl of noodles in a not-so-alien land.
Nothing but a friend in a foreign place,
inviting us all to be so understanding,
inviting us all to be less afraid of the exotic,
inviting us all to be our best selves in the end.
Jun 9, 2018
Jun 9, 2018 at 4:00 AM UTC
Give it to me, its what I want.
From you, from work, my friends, the world.
Everyone must know that I exist.
That I made an impact.
My soul didn't just drift away on the wind.
When the lights finally fizzled out
like a match being dropped in a glass of ***** water, something remained. I remained.
I was a explosion on the timeline, an etching in the granite, not a smudge on a whiteboard.
Wearing capes and guns, young boys acted out my adventures. Diving behind the couch to avoid the laser bombs exploding from every direction. Shooting into the darkness at the beasts I have conquered. Their mothers secretly wishing they could have me alone, fathers wishing they could have my
strength, courage, resolve.
Giving in to mediocrity is when you are
so sick of painting your house that you leave it beige.
You open the filing cabinet again and again, shuffling your dreams in to "to dos" or "another day" category.
At some point you have to admit that you will never be a famous potter, sculptor, wood worker, MC, writer or poet. No one is going to ever read that piece you sent to the New Yorker after reading that article about Anthony Bourdain's success at 44 years old.
You are not him,
you are not that good.
I thought it would be different when I went.
I thought they would have remembered
more of what I did but the truth is they don't.
They won't.
What even makes me-me? ? Its all bled into the crack of the sidewalk where I fell and broke my mind,
all those years ago.
But wait.
Its not over.
The hairs on the back of my neck spark like a rush of warm air in the summer night. They stand up straight when I think about the two humans we have created. They are hope.
I may not be the best but I am not the worst.
I will resonate throughout the ages through the life I have created
I am immortal
I am a father
Greatness has been achieved.
Significance has been gained.
The ego can rest.
for now
Mar 27, 2018
Mar 27, 2018 at 2:22 PM UTC
Saw a comment
In this age of interwoven everything
Incensed that Bourdain's death
Receive more attention than those
Of many lost veterans
(My father a veteran
With yet a glint of hope
To live out his years
To their natural end
And my grandfather
A serviceman long ago
Carrying light betrayals
Of this said great nation
Great men both, and)
Great those who give their all
Yet what gave us Bourdain?
Just as much
In equal measure
A life
Hard lived
Worn and weary and truthfully
Desperate
All peoples feel
The terrible weight of their sins
Even,
At days end,
Those who profess no belief
Bourdain gave art
Bought with sweat and blood and
Costly time
(For all of us
Time is valuable beyond gold)
Art
And food
And good cheer
Spent in the late evenings
And long mornings
Surrounded by all manner of
Gripping yarn
A double life?
Not unlikely
A wounded wanderer?
Most assuredly
A value immeasurable?
Beyond doubt
And what would we all do?
Should we write, or read, or sing, or paint, or eat, or travel, or labor, or rest, or weep, or laugh, or cook, or question, or answer, or defend, or break?
Love,
And live.
Veterans of this warring world
Cooks of worthy creations
Jun 10, 2018
Jun 10, 2018 at 11:44 PM UTC
To my Anthony Bourdain,
It has been a few hours since I heard the news, thanks to the almighty world wide web, I am too afraid to even look at my phone, I do not want to read about it, I do not want to believe that it is true, I cannot believe that it is true.
You are my idol, my hero, who opened my eyes not only to the culinary world, but to the parts unknown, you always go the extra mile, take the extra bite, or did you take too much?
I am so sorry that you have chosen this path, I cannot fathom what you have been through, I am only sorry for your sorrows, the depth of that sorrow, despair, loneliness while being surrounded by so many things happening, or whatever whoever likes to put it, I am sure there are no words to describe what kind of situation you were in, I am just sorry, I hope it is not what you want to bring us, to inspire us that drove you there, because, what you brought us was amazing.
I’d like to imagine maybe you are somewhere downing ***** shots, thinking, **** what have I done? Oh, well” and down another shot, wherever you are, I would like to say, thank you, my chef.
Jun 8, 2018
Jun 8, 2018 at 11:24 AM UTC
The news of late
Seems to amply relate
The quandary...
... so many wrestle with
In fixated perspicacious denial
Of just what happiness means
Serenity.... Viability ?
Financial security...solvency?
While what matters goes unsolved
Because we are ...so involved
In seeing only the success
They express....not the stress
They repress for us..
..the adoring public...
Caught up in our thinking
That we wish we were them.
Perfection in the reflection
Of the lucky ones who have it made.
So why do so many...
...take themselves out
When they could have stayed?
I do wonder...where we all would fall
Were we to seem to have it all
The life that they attain ..that persona
they maintain
That no one...it seems
can really see beyond
It too often doesn't dawn
Upon...me
To notice the human strain ...
....the common pain, that we see
so easily in each other.
I never saw it and I am so sorry...
And will miss you, Anthony Bourdain.
Farewell..Brother.
May you rest in peace .
Jun 9, 2018
Jun 9, 2018 at 2:59 AM UTC