Tonight's Poet Corner: I Hate Cucumbers

I Hate Cucumbers

by Belinda Roddie

It was around the time I hit double digits,

and my aunt took care of my siblings and me

when my parents escaped to French cafés and

London towers, that I realized how much I

despised cucumbers. Those atrocious little sliced

buggers hidden among the leaves that I was already

forced to munch on just tickled and tortured the

premature lobe of my underdeveloped brain, and I

cried after I had to eat them.

When I got older, I became less of a picky

eater, and a lot of the food I consume now is

the color green, from pastel to forest - spinach,

avocado, zucchini. Hell, I even got into pickles,

those crazy crunchers marinated in brine over time.

But never the things pickles used to be, never the

creature before reincarnation; not

cucumbers. I just couldn't stand 'em.

So really, when I think about it, as the

wheels in my head grow rusty sometimes and I

need just a little bit of creative oil to get them

turning again - I could question everything

about myself. Who I love. What I want. What I'll ever

know about my life or the goals I've 

chosen to charge for. But one thing I have

determined above all others, even when

my existence has flipped around and inverted

and I'm not even a

quarter of the individual I used 

to be - one thing that will 

never change, that will always be
the philosopher's bane of

truth - is that I hate cucumbers.