It's a rainy Monday
the kind that cries out
for the oven to be heated.
The type that begs for
a broken egg or two.
That beckons brown sugar
to leap from supple sack
to measuring cup.
Muscle memory in lead,
a container of flour
joins an orange box
and a "when it rains, it pours"
blue cylinder on the island.
Though someone else's kitchen
determined, divining hands
seek a wee brown glass bottle
from the depths
of a relative's spice cabinet.
A scan of the fridge door
reveals just enough butter:
one stick salted; one without.
That's alright; fix that in post.
Conjured out of the sighs
of plunging
barometric pressure,
cookies will themselves
into being.
Without a
trusty stand mixer
an audible is called:
melt the butter;
pour it into bowl.
Crack and whip
the pastured eggs
into warmed glass;
swirl the soft dough
into a glossy canvas
awaiting heaped
of fresh-cracked pecans
and a tsunami
of semi-sweet morsels.
And now the hardest step:
roll the dough into batons
in a slick sheet
of freezer paper;
stow the twin logs,
the ones that feel
like drowsy babes,
into the freezer for
a many hours slumber.
After a full, sluggish day,
the magic and science
of time hydrated
stubborn flour grains.
Distinct ingredients,
now recognizable as
an American classic:
Toll House cookie dough.
An impatient hand
plucks Batch A
from the frigid depths.
A red Victorinox
paring knife
chunks solid mass
into a range
of rugged mountains.
Place each peak
onto parchment;
place the tray
into a hot hearth.
An excruciating eleven
and a half minutes
separated by glass partition
and then the steaming discs
repatriate with this side
of the thermometer.
Shooing over-eager
littler hands
away, away, away!
then thwacking larger hands:
Wait! Wait! Wait.
After a nine hour build-up,
this simple proof of love
sits briefly in hand
before meeting long-awaiting teeth.
Love is a cookie
baking is the language
eating is the kinship
a smile is the thank you.
