From the Standard Cyclopedia of Recipes

Adapted from a collection of household instructions originally published in 1901, From the Standard Cyclopedia of Recipes bastardizes everyday tasks such as dyeing silks, brewing beer, fabricating paint and, of course, curing small pox and twists them into odd, dark poems. The pains of adolescence, the simple failure of love, the thrill of newfound lust—this collection outlines all the crests and troughs of our modern existence.

From "How to Temper Knife Blades":

There is a piece of iron between us,straight and hard at firstbut we have worked it.Warped the ironuntil it is curved nowto exactly us, fits the shape that lies inus two embracing. A line that runs from where our faces meet,the way we lay our necks on each other, the cut of our embraced torsos,tempered hot iron hips, twine of legs.