​Ode to Fish Sauce

By Anhvu Buchanan

You are sweet and salty,
fishy and funky.
You are the secret
ingredient to so many dishes.
When I was young I was scared
of you, of your taste,
of what others
might think if they knew
I was using you.
Yet you sustained
in history and in my life.
You are a love letter
written in the kitchens of our ancestors.
You are the fermenting,
the earth, the brine, the salt, the hands
all come to life.
And yet there are still some that fear you.
One man’s pungent smell is
another man’s memory of home.
When I smell you,
I smell my mother’s marinated pork
grilled and ready for us to meet again.
I hope you know how much
you mean to so many.
The lives you changed.
The meals you’ve saved.
The taste we will always long for.
Your smell drifting in our forever.

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Anhvu Buchanan is the author of The Disordered (sunnyoutside press) and Backhanded Compliments & Other Ways to Say I Love You (Works on Paper Press ) and Which Way To Go or Here (Platypus Press) co-written with Brent Piller. he was the recipient of the James D. Phelan Award and also received an Individual Artists Grant from the San Francisco Arts Commission. He received an MFA in creative writing from San Francisco State. He currently teaches in San Francisco and can be found online at www.anhvubuchanan.com or on twitter @anhvubuchanan.