The Optimism of French Toast
by Dorianne Laux
THE OPTIMISM OF FRENCH TOAST
by Dorianne Laux
No matter how many years since
the first bite passed my lips, that business
of eggs and day old bread, ribbon of syrup,
fireflies of butter sparking my tongue’s buds,
I think of my Acadian ancestors
landing on the shores of Nova Scotia, divining
logs from the deep woods, fashioning windows,
hanging laundry from two oars dug into sand—
the flags of domesticity flayed by the wind.
I see the fruits of their labor rise up
from the marshes: beets, parsnips, cabbages
and corn, and the wheat they ground
to powder and baked into bread.
And the chickens shook out egg after egg
we broke into shallow bowls, beat
with a spoon, each thick slice dipped
into that loom of albumen, chalazae and yolk,
then laid on a scrim of grease in the pan
where it sizzled its solitary song.
How could these French be
considered a scourge, their houses
burned to the ground they had worked,
forced to take the tangled circuitry
of dirt roads with nothing but what
they could carry on their backs? No time
for funerals, no place to go. And yet
here I am listening to Clifton Chenier
on the radio, daughter of a people
who refused to die, a sack of wheat
on the shoulder, spoon in a belt loop,
sugar sprinkled in a pant cuff,
a sleeping chicken hidden under a coat.