Coffee Cake

Coffee Cake

My great-grandmother would try to make the coffee cake
taste the way my great-grandfather's father used to
but she could never get it right.

He would go into the city to work in the steel mill every Monday
and every Friday he would return home with a little piece of heaven
wrapped in an old tattered napkin.

Every week, every week for what seemed like forever
he would finally come home at the end of the week
for a few days with his wife and son.

Every week, every week for a half century and change
she would once again attempt to get the coffee cake right
so her husband could taste his childhood again.

My great-grandfather's father died when he was twelve,
leaving him alone to take care of his mother
and a single last piece of coffee cake on the kitchen table.

My great-grandmother died some time later
but left him alone just the same,
with her last batch of coffee cake put away in a cupboard.

The services were short and sweet, and at the reception that followed
friends and family came to comfort my great-grandfather
but he knew they couldn't do anything for him now.

A few days, a few days that felt like an eternity past by
and one morning for breakfast he took down the pan of coffee cake
that was never quite right.

He took one bite and he saw his father walk in the front door
bending down in his uniform, covered in soot, to give his son a hug
and a tear appeared in his eye.

Ah, this is how coffee cake is supposed to taste.


poem written 11/1/06