boiled_tongue ovenbird She grew up at a time when it was common to pluck the thick masticating muscle from a cow’s mouth and eat it. As a child her living tongue tasted the dead flesh of another, a favourite dish made from the meat that once moved pulverized grass over an ungulate’s teeth. So tender and delicious, though it’s difficult to find now. She wistfully recounts the ways she would eat it if she could–cold tongue sliced thin, jellied tongue jiggling in aspic, a tongue roast. Her brother-in-law asked for tongue sandwiches in the hospital before he died, and just the other night her nephew had her over for dinner and his wife served tongue and she was delighted to find her mouth full of dense, rich, fleshy morsels. In my mind I see Lavinia, made mute, catching blood in a basin. “His Philomel must lose her tongue today,” but I have managed to keep my own by swallowing it whole. I can speak from the recesses of my gut, where truth is fed on powdered bone as fine as pastry flour. 260216 what's it to you? who go blather from