As soon as I put down my toad

Posted on February 15, 2006 by riverwriter
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I was
Making peach pie —
Making,
The act that precedes
Baking —
Baking is a scene
Between
Making
&
Eating —

So:

I was making peach pie —
But it wasn’t just
Peach pie;
It was
Sour cream peach pie —
That the family calls more-ish pie
‘Coz you always want more —
The kind with a dough crust
That I kneaded then rolled out of
Flour and shortning,
Ice cold water and salt —
And I peeled those
Rosey fuzzy peaches
With a small sharp paring knife —
They were rich pinky orange inside:
Soft, dripping luscious, freestone:
Spicey sweet:
Drip-along-your-forearms-to-your-elbows juicy:
Tempt you to sink teeth into
Until your chin is dripping —
Cut the oblong fruit into halves
Arranged in the bottom of the shell,
Which I had rolled out round, lifted in deftly
And shaped into the pie pan:
Gleaming juicy peach halves:
Pour on sour cream
Brown sugar . . .
Roll out another round of dough,
Cut into strips laid spaced and parallel
Fold back alternate strips from the centre,
Lay a strip over, perpendicular
Then replace and fold back the alternates
Until, presto: a woven top crust.

That’s where I was when Georgie walked by.

Georgie:
Four years old
Smiling
Barefoot
Busy with summer.

Seeing a chance to involve him, I said:
“Georgie, would you like to help Mummie?”

“As soon as I put down my toad”

Forget the pies.
Forget the summer.
Forget the universe.

That moment hangs in my existence
As one of the Beauties.

Part of me still lives there.

About riverwriter

Poet, playwright, duplicate bridge player, website designer, cottager, husband, father, grandfather, former athlete, carpenter, computer helper for my friends, theatre designer, backstage polymath, retired teacher of highschool English, drama, art, a baritone singer in a barbershop quartet, who knows what else? wordcurrents is on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wordcurrents/ Doug also has a Facebook page, "Incognitio", related to his novels.
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