I dip the egg into the boil. My hands start to sag in the steam, and I quickly draw them out of the billows, and toss the shell into the faraway trash bin.
I wait for the egg to firm, and if only to satisfy the craving of lingering scent and crackle I put Canadian bacon in a skillet of Israeli oil my mother gave me. I dye water into tea, hum, toast bagels, carve up a browning avocado. I initiate hurricanes with the skirts I layer like the stairs of the MET. This percussion permeates. I am preternatural, just feeding myself. I’m cooking rather than waking.
A movie during the blue hour is just right. Like Ratatouille or Roman Holiday. All the night creatures are going to sleep, and the day creatures are waking up. The perfect time to live vicariously through Remi or Audrey Hepburn. So, as I live this whole life, before anyone I know has brushed their teeth, morning borrows me. I find time to gather patience before it gets spent throughout the day. When I leave my house, I cool to room temperature bland and discovered.
My breakfasts are my strongest art. Like the day’s earliest birdsong, there are textures, layers, and traction. Sugars and medicine. Cooking is sort of slumber too. More than anything, breakfasting with the calls outside and uttering prayers as quietly as possible extend my sleeping hours, as I move limbs, slow as if not to wake them up.
I retrieve my white dollop from the pot and sprinkle it. Salt, pepper, and chives. I gather all my work together, seasoned for the day. Before the oils gather on my skin, before I begin worrying, or utter any chatter, I change colors. My whites and reds and grays become tattered by morning blues. I’m running while still, cooking while sleeping. True dreams flow into lost colors as soon as I leave the house, like steam causing my skin to sag. I am boiled in blue hour.