Lemon Cake
We use sour cream instead of butter
she said, and watched
as I took the first bite of her
freshly baked lemon bundt cake:
thick and moist,
a little bit burnt but—
not at all sweet,
because of the sour cream.
My daughter just graduated. You'd like her.
She is a writer, too,
back West,
where her sons went
and her husband,
and her.
I don’t question it because
she is wearing a navy shirt that says Berkeley,
and a navy hat that says Cal —
and it seems like a stupid thing to question
this lovelorn mother in her shop, perched
at the valley overlook: violet Berkshires nighting
in the distance, a stubborn sliver of pink sunset
refusing to wink out.
Where she sets her lemon cake out on a counter,
out on a backcountry road where the speed limit drops
sixty to twenty-five in a blind curve;
out where the young don’t stop for her to watch
savor
that first bite of a mother’s craft
or smell the loved lemon smell
or taste
what a difference
the sour cream makes.
##
Posted Apr 8, 2021, 10:04 PM UTC
First of all, the imagery truly brings this poem to life. You skillfully painted pictures with words and that's one of the things I enjoyed most in this poem:
Now, one little line I specifically enjoyed: "where the speed limit drops sixty to twenty-five in a blind curve." Now, you could have just mentioned "curvy roads" or something similar, but the way you added that extra attention to detail with the speed limit makes me envision a countryside with curved roads cutting through open plains under blue skies.
Next, I enjoyed the contrast between the "UC Berkeley California Urban" daughter and the "simple Middle-America country" mom. That was a nice touch.
I like how this line transforms the Lemon Cake from just a simple pastry to a work of art in which the mother takes pride. The sour cream is an interesting touch to this poem. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. Maybe it symbolizes the bitter-sweetness of living alone while your kids are off to another state? Maybe I'm way off. Either way, great poem.
I was already into the writing, but that "one little sliver" line got me nearly as much as the ending did.
I could really visualize the whole poem. I loved it!
This is a draft from a notebook I kept during my drive across the northern USA (working up the courage to edit them into a first chapbook); I think you nailed why this encounter stuck with me.
I'd stopped at her shop as the sun was setting, she seemed so thrilled to share this cake she'd just made. I don't know anything about cake. I was expecting it to be sweet, but it was savory. It was a little burnt and I'm sure a culinary critic would lambast other aspects, but to me it was perfect. The best cake I've had. Even, what, two years later? I can still taste it.
She started to tell me about her daughter who was around my age and it became clear she was a mother who took pride in being a mother, who was proud of the people she had birthed and raised, but whose people seemed so far off. Her in Massachusetts; her parents East in China, her children West in California.
The sour cream stuck with me because I think it did represent this special aspect of her. This sorrow, and bitter-sweetness as you get, of a mother so full of love, whose baking wasn't a culinary masterpiece or professional artwork, but a mother's craft, her art — her, you know, an essential part of her. Of a cake savory and not sweet, burnt and perfect.
In my edits I was looking to pull this theme to the fore, so I'm stoked that you picked up on it. Thanks for the thoughtful feedback ^^