Food Poetry: Breakfast in Aleppo

The intersection of food and poetry is a natural one: both are subjects that concern themselves with experience, memory, sense, and self. In honor of National Poetry Month, we've asked some of our favorite poets from around the world to share works—each poem in print for the first time overall or in English—that fuse the poetic with the edible.

Published Apr 12, 2013 12:00 AM

Food Poetry: Breakfast in Aleppo
Breakfast in Aleppo by Peter Balakian Muhamara, fig jam, zatar,
thin pita like soft parchment. I'm eating earth and air
as I fold it over cracked green olives. Peter Balakian's recent book of poems is Ziggurat (University of Chicago Press, 2010). He teaches at Colgate University. Ben Shadis

Breakfast in Aleppo

by Peter Balakian

Muhamara, fig jam, zatar,
thin pita like soft parchment.

I’m eating earth and air
as I fold it over cracked green olives.

Peter Balakian’s recent book of poems is Ziggurat (University of Chicago Press, 2010). He teaches at Colgate University.

PREVIOUSLY:

Food Poetry: Big Bowl
Food Poetry: (Two Untitled Poems)
Food Poetry: september 15, 2001
Food Poetry: The Sunday Milk Pudding

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