Criss-Crossed Blackened X's

Criss-crossed blackened X's mark the time. Sprinkles of little seeds and added yellow slices of garnish don't quite complete the dish, but do ease the sweetness of that sauce.

That sauce, sitting in its dish with pods of pineapple stealing heat from a sliced jalepeño, which oddly enough has stolen sugar from the fruit. The dish is itself a separate fixture of a plastered white house that is nothing more than a temporary home of a former animal.

The animal is herded, hung, cut, packaged, stored, cut again with smaller knife, and blackened with criss-crossed X's. A tree sees its life follow a similar path. Somehow the story line has changed though, as the tree has itself become the great agent of cruelty that pierces the blackened X to make a handle.

Handles hang over patterns of unburned x's and perfect cream colored mats. A napkin is placed and soon is wet from condensation dripping down a glass of ice water. The ice melts over conversations so refreshing the heat is simply forgotten.

A nice sigh and a closed eyed breath end with the criss-crossed blackened X's ringing 11 o'clock. Lunch break has ended.