Kitchen Terrorists by Erena Rae

Kitchen Terrorists

The door booted in is a bomb going off
as we rush to cover blenders and scales,

used, they claim, to manufacture incendiaries.
We hide them like children under our skirts.

Wired soldiers shout, aim to shoot. Nobody moves.
The flour on our hands gives us away,

we’ve been doing what mothers do.
A Brit on each arm, manhandled, we wait

for every orifice in the room to be searched.
They rifle through cupboards and drawers,

open the stove, leave it gaping, a dark
reproachful mouth. Pans, pots, all

fall like bodies from their hiding places.
Jars of jellies and jam bloody the sink.

This is our shame. What’s spilled that cannot
be cleaned. Accusations stick like fingerprints

on glassed rooms all across the country.
If they leave empty-handed, we will know

nothing more than when they came, only
what it is to be stopped and searched.

Authors’ note: Erena Rae (Feb. 15, 1941-May 19, 2006) was an art director, graphic designer, commercial illustrator, typographer, calligrapher, copywriter and editor. Her piece, Kitchen Terrorists, is a visual and verbal reflection on the first International Women's Delegation to the north of Ireland, 1993, organized by Bernadette Devlin McAliskey in Ireland and Betsy Swart in the U.S. The piece is a hand-printed linoleum cut with digitally printed typography on Okawara (100% kozo) paper • 12 x 8.5 • 2000.