All the way through doughnuts I sang along
With the radio because they were the last
Sweet things I laid my hands on before my shift
Was over.  My father was busy with icing,
Blending color with different degrees of sugar,
And then he had an hour of pastries to fill
With custard and fruit to compete with the rolls
On television which cakewalked to the oven.
In the bakery, time raised bread and browned it.
Time hand-rolled sandwich buns, carried pies
And coffee cakes to cool on countertops,
None of them strutting off their pans after
I stepped into snow, inhaling with the joy
I thought I’d earned before dawn, driving
The station wagon four miles to where
My mother was drinking sugared coffee
And eating zwieback she’d brought home stale
The night before. I heard news, weather,
And the drive-time deejay say Bobby Vee,
Connie Francis, or some sound-alike
For success because it was time for
The reasonable world to test itself.
And I left that car on the plowed street
So I could say the hell with shoveling
Our driveway with the snow still falling,
Exhaling with my mother before she closed
The door on the Chevy still warm and steered
It back to the bakery in the changing light
To sell to men finishing one shift
Or starting another at the mill,
Each carrying a bag of sweet things
Into the ordinary ends of morning.