Layered, airy —
what can I do?
I’m forced to think
of pâte à choux.
You say I am
dessert-obsessed?
I say my world view
is the best.
To meet the world
with proper confection
is the only way
I’ll survive this election.
With more thanks to photographer S.W. Berg,
and to Ritchey Woods, Fishers, IN.
Well, dear reader, I think it has happened: a new editing in WordPress.
The spacing in this is not what it’s supposed to be,
and I’ve tried everything I know to fix it.
Discouragement abounds,
angst, depression, fears;
my pate completely addled,
my brains ooze out my ears.
I feel as though I’m squeezed
by vise of pointless tripe;
innuendo and conspiracy
spring up in endless hype.
And isolation never helped
the cause of sanity;
it gives the upper hand
to crazed inanity.
I look for logic, reason,
a sense of what should be;
I find it in the bakery
in sweet geometry.
I do not make light, dear reader, of those who have little food. Or none at all. I know how fortunate I am to think about desserts.
Many thanks to photographer S.W. Berg
and to the artist-bakers at la Madeleine.
Let’s start the week
with a fond reminiscence
of life’s punctuation
with sweet evanescence.
Dessert is but transient
gone in a trice
yet forever recalled
as joy in a slice.
So here on purpled plate
an offering to you
of memory, then hope,
evoked by finest goo.
And maybe, dear reader, a day will come when we eat dessert with others —
safely!
Meanwhile, I salute you with blueberry goo and hope you are safe and healthy.
More thanks to photographer S.W. Berg, and his fine eye for desserts!
And applause to Forno, Baltimore, for the gorgeous presentation!
This date is a palindrome
so I think that it is right
to begin and to end dinner
with chocolate tonight.
Then forwards and then backwards
it’s the same, I must insist;
dessert both first and last
makes glad palindromist.
Well, all right: it doesn’t have to be chocolate. I’m flexible.
Many more thanks to photographer S.W. Berg.
Devoid of all drama,
Puritan plain,
roundly predictable,
pale and mundane,
the devious cheesecake
in flypaper disguise:
innocent aspect
entrapment belies.
Thanks yet again to photographer S.W. Berg.
Apple walnut cinnamon pie,
winter oven, my, oh, my.
Syrup’d slices, cinnamon dust
rise through nose to memory’s must:
oilclothed table, rolling pin,
floured apron, floor and chin,
pigtail peelings, glowing stove,
maybe nutmeg, maybe clove.
Coming in from bitter world,
boots well stomped and scarf unfurled,
amber warmth starts deep within
like radiator through my skin.
Kitchens of the long-ago,
swathed in early evening snow,
hug me still because I spy
apple walnut cinnamon pie.
Huzzahs and thanks to photographer S.W. Berg,
and kudos to dessert chefs at McCormick and Schmick’s, Virginia Beach, VA.
What memoried fragrance arises from this photo!
As this hectic season hurls us into next year,
I wish you, dear reader,
some sanity from a warm and spicy kitchen.
Sing a song of decadence,
a hymn to sweet excess,
paean to insouciance —
hail, oh, sticky mess!
Concupiscence so caramel’d,
so delicately plated,
inarguable its tenet:
self-restraint is over-rated.
With a tip of the hat (and maybe the scales)
to The Cake Bake Shop by Gwendolyn Rogers,
Broad Ripple, Indianapolis.
The art of persuasion
knows how to combine
a shy little house
and come-hither sign.
With so simple a glyph
Demosthenes’ voice
summons me in:
I’ve absolutely no choice.
Thanks yet again to photographer S.W. Berg.
Plated Rubenesque
aesthetic,
deliver me
from things ascetic!
The photographer says this dark chocolate bag is filled with whipped white chocolate.
Full swoon.
More thanks to photographer S.W. Berg.
And wild applause for the dessert chef at McCormick and Schmidt.
Life has its moments
of bliss unalloyed,
of humor splenic
roundly devoid.
When eye and nose
and memory combine
to flour and fat and filling
enshrine.
In pie, in pie
the toothsome all:
in fragrance, form,
the anti-banal.
If ever our being
you seek to justify,
look but to crusted
invention of pie.
With many salivating thanks to photographer S. W. Berg.
And kudos to pastry artist Jennifer Berg.
Full disclosure: I couldn’t bake a pie even if you threatened me with Brussels sprouts.
But I can eat it.
