crime scene

The cutting board looks like somebody got murdered. Somebody flashy, evidently, perhaps an Elvis impersonator, because it is a garish stain. It had been fuschia, and it is now passing through crimson, madder and other shades I remember being closely regulated by art teacher types. It shows no signs of fading in the direction of a seemly rust or brown.

No violence took place in the kitchen, of course, only beets. Still, it always feels slightly taxidermic to squeeze the little boiled roots out of their skins, set them naked in a bowl, heap the empty skins on the board, set the bowl in the refrigerator with incriminatingly carmine hands. Turning back and seeing the long red tails hanging from the board's edge I feel like the farmer's wife with her carving knife. I scoop up the wee, sad, vegetable fells and slide them into the garbage, but for the rest of the day I move through the house like Lady Macbeth, and the wooden cutting board looks like a crime scene for a week.