☀️ The Daily Boost #869

I count you blessed

The Daily Boost (published weekdays) is one of the newsletters of The Raft, the online community of author Phyllis Cole-Dai. We Rafters ride the river of life buoyed by music, poetry, and other arts, along with open spiritual practice. Most everything here is free, but patrons (paid subscribers) get some special perks as a gesture of gratitude.

Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash

BREAD
Richard Levine

Each night, in a space he’d make
between waking and purpose,
my grandfather donned his one
suit, in our still dark house, and drove
through Brooklyn’s deserted streets
following trolley tracks to the bakery.

There he’d change into white
linen work clothes and cap,
and in the absence of women,
his hands were both loving, well
into dawn and throughout the day—
kneading, rolling out, shaping

each astonishing moment
of yeasty predictability
in that windowless world lit
by slightly swaying naked bulbs,
where the shadows staggered, woozy
with the aromatic warmth of the work.

Then, the suit and drive, again.
At our table, graced by a loaf
that steamed when we sliced it,
softened the butter and leavened
the very air we’d breathe,
he’d count us blessed.


(from A Tide of a Hundred Mountains)

(My thanks to Richard Levine, via Poetry Foundation.)

The Gentle Nudge

• LAY A BLESSING STONE: Here. Or learn about our blessing-stone practice at this link.

• No Poetry Pick-Me-Up next week due to the Thanksgiving holiday in the US

• UPCOMING: “Calming the Heart” patron bash with James Crews (Zoom, December 15, 6PM CT). Details here.