June 24: New Poem, Lemon Curd, Robert Frost

I did write a new poem this morning, but I wasn't sure if it was good enough to share until this afternoon.  It was inspired by something a member of my book club said last night at our gathering.  We were talking about the recipes in Cakewalk, the memoir we read.  Some people really liked reading the recipes, and other people found them distracting.  My best friend, Wondertwin, said, "I love reading cookbooks."  She sits and read cookbooks like novels.  Her statement stayed with me all night.

Lemon curd

Wondertwin made vanilla cupcakes with lemon curd for the book club party last night.  They were D-I-V-I-N-E.  Everybody loved them.  We talked a lot about the food described in the book.  We also talked about mental illness and family dysfunction and Ronald Reagan, but mostly about cakes and cupcakes and pancakes.  It was a wonderful time.  The conversation also turned to people's artistic talents and passions.  One of Wondertwin's real talents is baking beautiful, delicious cookies and cakes.  My talent happens to be language and poetry.  Baking relaxes Wondertwin; writing relaxes me.  Other passions named were sewing and running and quilting. 

This morning, when I sat down to write today's poem, as I promised I would, Wondertwin's cookbook fetish and lemon curd stuck with me, as did the discussion about talents and gifts.  I kept coming back to these subjects, even though I was trying to write about something else.  Eventually, I just gave in.  The poem turned into a reflection about art and passion and language and poetry, with Robert Frost thrown in for good measure.

I'm still not sure this poem is done, but I'm going to offer it up anyway, warts and all.  It has been rewritten three or four times already, trying to find the perfect ingredients.  It's not as good as Wondertwin's lemon curd cupcakes, but it's getting pretty damn close.

Saint Marty is ready to send this poem out into the world.

Recipe

My friend reads cookbooks

The way I read poetry, hungry

For each line, each word chosen

Like tiles in a Byzantine Christ,

Pieced together, stone-by-stone,

Color-by-color, into a creation

Greater than its parts.  My friend

Mixes twelve egg yolks, salt,

Sugar, lemon zest and juice,

Butter into lemon curd, spoons

It into vanilla cupcakes, follows

A recipe she discovered

In her grandmother's Betty Crocker,

Creates a poem of vanilla, citrus,

Something her mother's mother first made

As a young girl with whisk,

Heat, ice.  As she licks her finger,

My friend reads the recipe again,

Sees where her grandmother

Crossed out "Makes 3 cups,"

Penciled in "5 cups" in careful

Letters, underlined it twice.

This revision, made over 40 years ago,

Reminds my friend of the white

Moons of her grandmother's fingernails,

Her kitchen stove, hot as July,

The abundance of curd in her bowl.

I think of Robert Frost working

In his notebook, scribbling his last line

And miles to go before I sleep,

Reading it over, then writing

And miles to go before I sleep

Again, as if he needed one more

Egg, a pinch of cinnamon, to fill

His pastry until it overflowed.

Robert Frost's draft