November 14, 2023

rise

Let’s make trays and trays of cookies, uncountable loaves 
of banana bread. Let’s speak to each other in baked goods, hug 
in our oven mitts over a granite island speckled with flour. Let’s 
stack our fortunes in Ghirardelli bittersweets, form an army from 
vanilla extract and teaspoons of baking soda, drift in the kitchen vapors 
swirling between our shoulder blades. I’m putting butter out to soften, 
reaching for measuring cups and mixing bowls, lifting eggs 
from their carton cocoons. Blast the Cuisinart—I want to do everything 
by hand, feel the whisk against stainless steel, find the yield in the dough,
shape one world at a time, watch it rise.