Txakolina
︎︎︎ Selen
︎ July 18, 2025
The bottle I bought after you
said you’d liked the chalky clean of it, once—
later I was burning
a chicken breast with no lemon to deglaze it,
no vinegar I wouldn't clean with—
I popped it. Corkscrewing the foil,
the cork crumbled into the sear.
The sputtery black butter settled.
The carbon paled.
The chicken char glossed brown.
I knifed off the crud.
I learned from this bottle
that when whales were beached or speared,
Basque sailors got a useful mass
of rotted blubber, and under it,
bones to trellis grape leaves.
They stuck the ribs in dirt.
They tied vines to the arches.
They pruned until the shape kept.
They skinned grapes yellow from this green.
They crushed them and waited for sweetness.
I poured something not that clear into what I botched.
I drank the rest.
It passed me, slowly, past you
to be gutted all my life by people punier
than what I wanted to give you.
said you’d liked the chalky clean of it, once—
later I was burning
a chicken breast with no lemon to deglaze it,
no vinegar I wouldn't clean with—
I popped it. Corkscrewing the foil,
the cork crumbled into the sear.
The sputtery black butter settled.
The carbon paled.
The chicken char glossed brown.
I knifed off the crud.
I learned from this bottle
that when whales were beached or speared,
Basque sailors got a useful mass
of rotted blubber, and under it,
bones to trellis grape leaves.
They stuck the ribs in dirt.
They tied vines to the arches.
They pruned until the shape kept.
They skinned grapes yellow from this green.
They crushed them and waited for sweetness.
I poured something not that clear into what I botched.
I drank the rest.
It passed me, slowly, past you
to be gutted all my life by people punier
than what I wanted to give you.