‘Prize Malted Brown’ by Owen Simmons from The Book of Bread (1903)
It was my turn to offer the challenge to the Inklings. Newly in love with the Public Domain Image Archive, I suggested that each poet plug a color into the search bar and use one of the images as her inspiration. Like Molly and Heidi, I found that searching for more esoteric colors like aubergine gave no results. So I searched “brown” and got this slice of “Prize Malted Brown” and a small poem about baking.
But that last line got me thinking about how baking bread is like writing, which is also “all process” and this draft happened:
So here, on a virtual plate, I offer you not one, but TWO slices today!
Here’s what the rest of the Inklings came up with, if life gave them the elbow room this month to write:
Heidi @my juicy little universe
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Linda @A Word Edgewise
Catherine @Reading to the Core
Carol has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at Beyond LiteracyLink.
A(nother) Year of Reading 
Mary Lee, your idea for the Inkling’s challenge is an interesting one. I never thought to visit the Public Domain Image Archives to use as a prompt. Your image of toast and its color led to finding a mentor text that was put to good use. I am going to visit the Archive and see what I can come up with. Baking bread and writing – a process that turned into an inspiring draft. Be sure to share your final work with us when it is ready.
My first comment did not go through so let me see if this one works.
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Thank you for the two slices of bread today. I especially like the scalloped edges on the poem.
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Okay, both are winners, and hasn’t “Prize Malted Brown” got to come in somewhere?
But what I really want to say is that it amazes me how one word, a “the” instead of an “a,” can make so much difference to a poem, as in “THE plate with the scalloped edges” instead of “A plate.”
Changes everything for the baker and the baked, and for the guest. It’s process and it’s product too. Yum.
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Thanks for the great idea to use the archive for inspiration. I loved seeing the two versions of your poem. When poets share revision, I always learn something. Sometimes I think a poem is “done” but realize after some extra time baking a bit, I was glad I was patient.
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Thanks for a great challenge this month, Mary Lee. (I have the feeling a lot of PF regulars are going to be playing around in that archive now!) Your two poems offered up a delightful feast today, and are delicious companions. I love how one led to another in that ongoing process and the simple perfection of that scalloped edge.
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Gifting a slice of bread or of the written word makes everyone grateful, something created, something shared! Love how you enriched that somewhat bland picture, Mary Lee! Your prompt idea brought so many great poems this week!
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I adore both of these poems, Mary Lee. The form (Fib, right?) was exactly the right choice for poems about creating something new from what sometimes seems like thin air. Your offer of warm bread is gratefully accepted and happily was echoed when the art teacher appeared at my door yesterday with a loaf of bread her husband made! Thank you for this terrific challenge.
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Not Fib — nonet. Start with one syllable in the first line and add a syllable in each line until you get to a 9-syllable line. 🙂
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Thanks for the nourishing bread slices today! What a fun prompt!
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I will happily gobble up both slices, Mary Lee.
“It’s all a process” — yes.
And, like Heidi, I noticed the power of “the” instead of “a” to denote the particular plate with the scalloped edges. The details in the process make all the difference.
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oooooh! I have spent so much time enjoying the public domain website…never would have picked, “brown.” Love how your nonet requires kneading, transitions, then rises, like bread.
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I thought the same thing about process in writing after reading your first poem, Mary Lee. Love your follow up (and your original!)
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Thank you for the double toastie, Mary Lee. After your first poem, I was thinking how much baking was like writing, so I loved reading on to your second version!
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I do love the gentle reminder that good things take the right ingredients, some effort, a bit of heat (maybe encouragement, some stress or even tribulations) and of course time.
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