In my family we travel for bread. 1 1/2 hours roundtrip for great bagels? Sure! 2 hours? Well, maybe… We also bake bread. And eat and eat and eat bread. We’re easily influenced by carbohydrates and enjoy every moment of our continual surrender. So, I was delighted when Diane Mayr posted a yeast-related prompt in Laura Shovan’s February Challenge. She included a fascinating short video about all things yeasty. Surely I could rise to the occasion?
My first effort was an acrostic:
Yeast
Your best efforts
eventually end up
as
stale
toast.
©Molly Hogan
Well, that seemed a bit depressing, although it did make me laugh.
I went back to the drawing board, and here’s what I came up with next–a very drafty (reverse?) acrostic:
Resilience
You’re never sure if you are
Equal to the challenge
A promise in the making but
Sometimes you fail. Still,
Time is on your side
Time to work your magic
Small beings can effect great change
And there you are
Elastic under life’s punches
You rise, you fall
©Molly Hogan, draft
At least that one was a bit more optimistic. Maybe.
Eventually, I moved away from acrostics and ended up with this poem:
Breaking Bread
The yeasty aroma
draws me in.
I belly up to the table
slice thick slabs
slather on the butter.
After a couple,
my inhibitions scatter
with the crumbs.
I engage
in rampant gluttony,
deliciously carbdizzy.
Only thinking about
the next bite
and the one after that.
Who says you can’t
get drunk on bread?
©Molly Hogan, draft
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by Tricia Stohr-Hunt on her blog, The Miss Rumphius Effect.
Nix the comfort zone 
Homemade bread…yum! I’m amazed you got three poems out of it. I like how you progressed from a snarky acrostic to carbdizzy drunk on bread. Laura’s project has been quite the challenge. I love reading the poems but it’s too hard to get to all of them and to comment. Thanks for sharing these here.
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I’ve realized that I can really only comment on about 4 or 5 poems and that’s it. I can’t even begin to read them all either. Still, I love participating!
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Love the poems, and after the last one, could almost taste it, feel the texture and the dripping butter. Yum!
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Bread is my comfort go-to! Today we’re anticipating significant snowfall, so my thoughts have already turned to bread making!
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Perfect! Enjoy!
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“We’re easily influenced by carbohydrates and enjoy every moment of our continual surrender.” << I love this!
The poems are all delightful! I love how they all explore different aspects of yeast and bread in different poetic forms. I find the second one philosophical and inspirational (who knew yeast could be inspiring?)
"Small beings can effect great change
And there you are
Elastic under life’s punches
You rise, you fall"
Thanks for sharing these today. (Of course, now I want some freshly baked bread, since just before this I read Jama's post about toast!)
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Thanks! It was fun to play around a bit–one of the joys of having a week off!
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I knew I had to pop over here the instant I saw the word bread! I can smell the bubbly yeast from here. Thanks for sharing!
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One of the best smells ever, right?!
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I love these. Our family shares a preoccupation with bread – baking it, trying to figure out the best way to make bagels — it’s a Whole Thing. I really like poems about “pedestrian” things, and the yeast really resonated with me. Thanks for these.
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Oh, have you figured out the bagel recipe? If so, do you share? We’ve flopped abysmally with our efforts, which is why we’re willing to travel to get some.
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Oh Resilience, Molly, seems like such a metaphor!! I LOVE bread but to answer your question in your last poem, KETO and those of us with insulin resistance to any degree really have to avoid carbs (both the bread type and added sugar and fruit sugar) to lose or maintain weight loss. What a bummer. A bread-lover, but not a maker. You make me drool and that is a good thing because I can enjoy imagining your happiness which is terrific!!!
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Thanks, Janet! Having to avoid bread and carbs must be a huge bummer. 😦
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How fun to see all three! Your first acrostic made me laugh out loud. The ending of the second made me say YES! And the “carbdizzy” of the third…pure brilliance!
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Thanks, Mary Lee. I’m glad that first acrostic made you laugh, too. 🙂
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Yummy, yum, yum! I think this little nugget is a poem inside the longer poem…”And there you are
Elastic under life’s punches
You rise, you fall”
Wonderful response to the prompt, Molly! I haven’t tackled that one yet.
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I can’t resist yeast in any form, but I still have plenty of other prompts awaiting my efforts. You’ve been channeling some big feelings into your responses and I’ve loved reading them. Also, I hope school’s been better this week.
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I loved these before, Molly, still adore “carbdizzy”. I don’t bake bread much anymore but have a sweet memory of sourdough, my husband & I making a meal of it with some wonderful cheese, & wine – the best. I also love “Elastic under life’s punches” – maybe the title of another poem?
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What a lovely memory, Linda. The best.
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I definitely grew up in a family where bread meant life, and I absolutely feel that this sometimes humble food staple, so often taken for granted, is worthy of the poetic treatment!
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The history of yeast is absolutely fascinating. I was so glad Diane included the video!
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Mmmm, my kind of post. Love all your yeasty poems, Molly. You definitely rose to the occasion with this challenge!
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Rumor has it that you wrote about toast…I’ll definitely be checking that out!
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All your bread poems are slices–or slabs–of yeasty goodness. But as often happens, my favorite bit of your post is in the intro: “we enjoy every moment of our continual surrender.” What happy people you must be, underneath it all. Bread as medicine. Breadicine. “I took the prescribed breadicine but found it made me carbdizzy, and now I go to weekly YA meetings.” (Yeastoholics Anonymous) Please pardon my foolishness, Molly!
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lol Thanks for sharing your “foolishness” Heidi. Breadicine–love it!
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I am a fellow bread-a-holic… succumbing to sourdough whene’er a loaf becomes crumb. Hail to bread, and to bread poems in all their forms!
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Hail to bread, indeed! Thanks for stopping by!
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Molly, the last poem is one I can relate to. The smell of homemade bread floats through the air and I am definitely a lover of deliciously carbdizzy moments. I am making a carb heavy dinner for my family with a pizza for the appetizer. Yum. Your poems make me happy today.
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