Toast 
    It's worth getting up for.
    Just at dawn, on a dead-of-winter walk,
    I could smell it wafting from homes
    all around the lake as they
    emerged from the dark like loaves
    from an oven, steaming.
    Is there an aroma more divine
    than that of bread warming, bread
    browning, crisping for the spread
    of butter and marmalade, the sprinkling
    of sugared cinnamon? Whatever
    terrors the night might harbor,
    how bad can it get, if hot slices
    stack our morning plate, the white
    ones patterned with cobalt blue?
    It's what in the current vernacular
    we'll all eventually be: a pleasant
    redolence rising and haloing
    a roughed up, frozen expanse –
    for such days, we make
    not-too-burnt offerings of thanks;
    we raise our glasses of juice.

                          Susan Deborah King