Dim Sum

I know, I know, if Hemingway
had savored the chicken feet in sauce
at the great NBC
dim sum restaurant
in Monterey Park,California,
he
still would have...could have...


and say Richard Brautigan,
even toward the withered end,
had paused for just a single taste
of the scallops at the NBC,
or ordered the platter with three
huge cream-filled dumplings,
still he would have, still he could have,

I know, I know, but if only
John Berryman...Anne Sexton...
if Sylvia Plath, Primo Levi...
if Kathryn's father,
Vince Foster,
if Marilyn
Monroe....