Kluski with Onions and Bacon- A Poem

Kluski (pronounced klooh-ski, with a short “oo” as in book) are a dumpling, and were one of my favourite dishes.

My mother mixed the dough; then would scoop the mixture with a tablespoon and simply slip it, from the spoon, into boiling water. Here’s a nice explanation and video in which the cook explains the dumplings can be slipped directly into broth, too. It’s a way to fill hungry bellies, and make ingredients go further. My father made kluski, too, but he omitted the egg (traditional and more nutritional), the way I liked it. I’ve always had a thing about food textures.

The form of this poem is a gogyohka, which is a five-line poem of one phrase per line. I chose this form as a simple way to reflect the thought of the child.

More of my original ekphrastic (responding to art) poetry here. More about the painting in the source link in the caption.

Kluski with Onions and Bacon

As a child
the best potato dumplings
were flour without egg
because egg made them
too wiggly.

©elsp 2025