Or how my love of cake got weird in poetry, or a sneak peek at my dissertation.
Perky Pineapple Upside-down Cake (or other inappropriate cake title)
She got hair like cinnamon like spice cake sometimes like carrot cake
Her face like white wedding cake with clear vanilla extract
Her eyes bright like professional strength concentrated green gel
coloring, Enough green to last a lifetime if well kept
Her lashes like dark chocolate ribbons in centimeter curls
With freckles like milk chocolate sprinkles except for the one on
Her right temple- that’s more like a chocolate jimmie
Her dimples, her cheeks like light strawberry cake like the box kind
The best kind, the perfect shade of pink when she blushes
Topped with gold dust, her cheekbones glisten
Her lips a deeper red velvet, her tongue glides across lighter
cream cheese teeth until smooth
Her neck like layer cake, tall- her shoulders a cake board base,
A place to rest your head if she’ll let you
Her breasts like perky pineapple upside-down cake, like cupcake liners
someone overfilled more than two-thirds of the way
Her hips thick like homemade whip cream, like the kind of buttercream
you can’t help but lick the mixing bowl clean
Her fingers delicate like angel food cake,
like sponge cake, like tiramisu ladyfingers
She makes you tingle like Pop Rocks icing
sizzling when your tongue touches, like magic
You savor her salty skin, like maple bacon cakes, like salted caramel icing
She can be experimental, exciting like chocolate chili cupcakes
with cayenne pepper and chipotle, She fiery like Red Hot cinnamon
She acts sophisticated like tea cakes, like petit fours,
Like tiny edible silver sugar pearls
But you love her most when she doesn’t try too hard or stray too far
Like plain yellow cake with chocolate frosting still delicious
She can be a little tart like lemon cake, like key limes
But you accept it in return for the times when she surprises you like
surprise cake- not the kind you find at bachelor parties, but like the
first bite of whiskey ganache inside a chocolate cupcake,
bitter bourbon balanced by sugary sweet
She isn’t always strong, sometimes she falls like deflated soufflé
She crumbles like cracked cakes stuck to the pan
But most of the time she’s sturdy like pound cake, like rock cakes
She can be hot or cold, the kind of girl whose mood changes with the
weather seasons like peppermint in the winter and pumpkin in the fall
But you fall for her soft rich body all the same because
She fun like funfetti cake, like rainbow cake she full of color
Except on dark chocolate days when no matter what you say,
you can’t get her to change back to vanilla-
The closest you got was marble cake once
And when you ask her to marry you,
You’ll hide the ring in the cake, you’ll sit patiently
You’ll wait as she forks through crumbles slowly savoring every morsel,
and you’ll have no idea what she will say.