breakfast by Jenny Hong
i awaken to the promise of eggs that burst open and bleed joy into the pores of toast, thick and inviting, spilling over the edges like a sunrise. my mother dries her hands on a yellow towel and brings out a basket of lychee, pushing a thumbnail into rough, leathery skin, and moon meets mesa as she peels back from the flesh a membrane pink and thin as an eyelid from sleep. she tells me i need to be careful out there, a morning routine, rattles off things i need to look out for and i know every word before she says it but i listen as i fill my mouth with the taste of home because every ten a.m. breakfast is a reminder that our lychees are numbered, that yolk leaks out of egg white too fast to hold onto, that no smudge of daylight peeks over the crust of horizon without intending to stay, and no sunrise is accidental. - j.h. While reflecting on my last few days of summer before leaving for college, I remembered seeing this anxious, sorrowful look on my mother’s face. I realized that while we anticipated the future, we were both trying to hold on to something, wondering whether breakfasts and lychees and our relationship would ever be the same.
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