An Ode to Breakfast

I’ve rediscovered the pleasure of cereal with fresh blueberries eaten in the sunny morning on my balcony. I’ll miss this terribly in the winter, when it will probably be dark and most certainly cold when I eat my breakfast, but one can find joy in it anyway. This poem came out of thinking about dining on my balcony in the fall, which I couldn’t really do last year for lack of outdoor furniture. After October and November wrote themselves, I simply had to keep going.

I realise this is not an ode but I couldn’t come up with a better title, so you’ll have to live with it. It’s inspired by Maurice Sendak’s beloved Chicken Soup with Rice — which taught me the months of the year — and by Molly Wizenberg’s delicious food essays in A Homemade Life, which I’m sad to have finished reading.

I should note while most of these are things I’d eat for breakfast, I should very much like more than a slice of bread and a mandarin orange. That would be a paltry breakfast, indeed.

An Ode to Breakfast

In January’s cupboard forage, a slice of bread and a mandarin orange.

In February’s dim and gloom, leftover soup with a silver spoon.

In March the weather starts to turn; for bacon and fried eggs I’ll yearn.

For April I’d like eggs poached, scrambled, boiled or on some toast.

In May I think I might just try to bake a morning apple pie.

In June I must not forget to make a basil omelet.

In July’s berry dream, a plate of waffles doused in cream.

For all of August, if you please, a bowl of cereal with blueberries.

In September’s temperamental weather, I think yogurt on granola’s better.

In October I shall eat hot pancakes on my balcony.

In November’s rainy weather, a bowl of porridge and a cosy sweater.*

For December’s hopeful snow, maple syrup poured on French toast.

* Eating sweaters is not recommended.