Iceberg Lettuce

What vegetable leviathan

extends beneath the dinner table,

an unseen, monstrous green that pulls

the chair out from under our faith

 

in appearances: see a mere tuft

of leaf on the plate like a wing,

but if it flies away, it undoubtedly

will disturb the continental drift

 

asleep under the salad plate,

the hidden world we forget

as we reach for the smaller fork—

(and now, mouth full, don't speak: politely

 

chew your leaf of firmament

that's torn and tossed up in vinegar here as

we'll be tossed before its vast

root maybe someday or any moment).