Red meat;
first choice of loins just two per beast,
pierced on raw wood,
spaced by bacon in fists-full
on a three-foot stripped down cedar spit.
Stick it near a roaring fire,
let the sizzle juice run
down the wood
from loin to loin,
swallowed in the hungry cracks,
overflow streams spurt-flux to the next one down.
Squeeze lemon juice, all you want, let it run,
garlic any way you have to get it on.
Wine?
What kind you got?

–Bobby Steve Baker,
Numbered Bones (2011), Accents Publishing

Bobby Steve Baker was born in Ontario, Canada in 1951, but has lived and practiced cosmetic surgery in Lexington, Kentucky for many years. He holds an MFA degree in Poetry from National University and has published in various literary journals, including Ann Arbor Review, Boston Literary Magazine, andGrey Sparrow Journal. In 2009, his poetry in tinfoildresses was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Bobby grew up in a home where poetry was ever-present but began to write seriously only in the past few years.