June 12, 2025
Birthday Cake
- Start with a clean house.
OK, well, if not clean exactly,
Your messes discreetly set aside.
Company ready. - Flour the floor,
Inadvertently, as you
Flour the cake pans,
7 of them,
To make, as requested
Chocolate and strawberry. - Old champagne in the fridge,
Was it leftover from Easter?
Flat for weeks,
Like so many things left around the house
Past their prime,
You failed to discard it.
It works in the cake. - While cakes are in the oven—batch 1
The recipe calls for:
Compote, crumbles, Swiss meringue buttercream.
Pick one.
Add more flat champagne, why not? - The chocolate batter now—
Don’t lose your place between soda and salt,
Miscount the eggs,
As you look up
To greet arriving guests. - Serve dinner to a crowd—
Paper plates. Careful,
The broth drips
Off the flimsy rims.
Cake timer pings
as you sit down to eat. - You’re almost ready:
Cakes cool on the counter,
Compote bubbles on the stove,
Butter at room temperature,
A house full of people who love your daughter. - Leave the table loud with laughter
To beat butter and powdered sugar,
Launching a fine sweet cloud
To settle atop the floured floor. - It’s time for cake,
Not yet cooled,
Not trimmed,
The crowd awaits, the birthday girl
Needs to get to bed.
Frost it anyway,
Tucking back in place
The layers slipping like tectonic plates,
Gliding on molten buttercream. - Light seven candles,
Turn off the lights,
Don’t look at the floured, sugared floor,
The accumulated pile of dishes,
Drips of dinner,
The tottering cake.
Look up at the candlelit face
Of your beaming daughter,
Surrounded by love,
Flush with joy.
To the members of the Mid-Week Retreat Core Group, who have become family and love our kids well. XOXO
