May 17, 2016

chocolate chips

It used to be about roses, about slowing down enough to lean in
to a spiral of diaphanous petals, and sniff. When you thought about it,
you could conjure a particular shade of pink and your grandmother's thin wrists
leaving a wake of perfume. In your mind's tinted eye, you could wander
that garden, bring a picnic if you wanted, lean back into the grass
and let yourself grow drowsy with leisure. Now, the timeline
has dwindled. You have the equivalent of 11 minutes, and all you see
is thorns. So instead, you burst into the kitchen for eggs and flour,
turn the oven on 350 as you wait by the phone for the latest news, and the past
disappears and the dough rises and the room fills with a brief but perfect sweetness.