"Young Girls and Yeast Rolls," A Poetry Post

Young girls need
yeast roll recipes and
mouths to feed.

Teenage females
bogged down in hormonal
wastelands...

20-somethings
worried about the
possible permanence of
singleness...

30-somethings
stressed about the
hindrance of their
progress...

All you need is a
big red bowl and a
big spoon.

2 packs of active dry yeast

A little salt and sugar

Lard and butter

Water

A big bag of flour and
direction

Muffin pans

For all your worrying,
yeast comes alive
when it's time.

For all your mixing in,
dough comes together
when it's ready.

For all your appetite,
the batch doubles
when it doubles.

And when it rises,
it's got to be beat down again
before it achieves it's
best leavening.

And you still don't have bread.

After swinging that spoon around and around,
and waiting,
and punching,
and waiting,
you still have to grease up your hands,
turn that bread out on a floured surface and
knead... knead... knead...
shape...
knead... knead... knead...
shape...
divide...
prepare the pans and
preheat the stove.

Time the baking just right.

The higher up you go,
the more delicate the process.

Depending on your experience,
sometimes you lose a lot of the benefits by
putting the yeast in too hot water or
mixing the flour in just too fast or
washing some good parts off your hands with the waste or
letting that good work go unmonitored and flow
over the side of the bowl,
all over the countertop and
onto the floor below.

Sometimes it takes you hours to get it
kneaded and
divided and
seated in the muffin pans
and placed into the baker
just so.

Sometimes you mess around and
fall asleep on the best time to
remove the pans.

But sometimes,
you set that yeast perfect.
You mix those dry goods perfect.

You time that doubling best.
That punch down is a pleasure.

That second rise brings a smile.
That knead and shape is simple.

Your preheat comes naturally.
Your baking is magically even...

And the scent of your intended purpose
wafts into the lives of those around you,
interrupting their thinking space and
making their mouths water in
anticipation of what you've got coming
next.

Young girls need yeast roll recipes
to understand their risings and their fallings,
their beat downs and their comeuppances,
their molding and their separation,
their waiting and their emergence.

Big bowls and the
weight of a thick mix in the
crook of a small arm

Measuring cups and spoons requiring
precise attention

Housefuls and housefuls of
hungry mouths to feed to understand the way of
the female nature

Hot kitchens

Frustration and celebrations

Patience

Time

-T. D. James-Moss