Old Roads, New Stories: A Literary Series
I’ve stood in the ice caves on Mount Rainier, but I’ve spent more time in bakeries. Bakeries are environments too, and next month—I’m not making this up—is National Hot Breakfast Month. So to get us all good and ready for that, here’s a poem:
The Baker’s Story
She thought it might be funny,
and a little bit romantic:
leaving him a trail of muffin tops
to their room.
Her husband was always on the late shift,
and she was always gone before dawn—
warm bread, hot coffee,
butterhorns like sundials…
the life of a baker,
and a good one; no regrets.
But, of course, the dog—
she should’ve thought of this—
wolfed everything
and threw up.
And if your husband comes home,
and you’re down on the floor ass-naked
mopping up vomit with a beach towel,
then isn’t this also funny, and a lot like love?
Rob Carney’s first collection of creative nonfiction, Accidental Gardens, is out now from Stormbird Press, and his new book of poems, Call and Response, is available from Black Lawrence Press. Previous books include Facts and Figures, The Last Tiger is Somewhere, The Book of Sharks, and 88 Maps.
Read an interview with Rob Carney appearing in Terrain.org: “The Ocean is Full of Questions.”
Read Rob Carney’s Letter to America in Dear America: Letters of Hope, Habitat, Defiance, and Democracy, published by Terrain.org and Trinity University Press.
Read poetry by Rob Carney appearing in Terrain.org: 6th Annual Contest Finalist, 4th Annual Contest Winner, and Issue 30. And listen to an interview on Montana Public Radio about The Book of Sharks.
Header photo by Photowill, courtesy Pixabay.
