A Miracle for Breakfast

“A Miracle for Breakfast” is a sestina—the same end words occur throughout the seven stanzas—but it’s also a lyric and a narrative. It’s a lyric because it’s short and expresses personal emotions—the feelings the speaker has about breakfast, the miracle (or not miracle), and the personal vision of the villa. The poem is also a narrative since it tells the story of a somewhat surreal breakfast experience. As the narrator of the story—the speaker—doesn’t disclose much about themselves, it makes sense to refer to the speaker as they/them since the speaker could be anybody.

The speaker’s tone is exact. They specify the time, “six o’clock” (Line 1), and explain what’s happening—“[w]e were waiting for coffee” (Line 1). Conversely, the tone is somewhat elusive since the speaker never details who composes the “we.” Yet the speaker provides a hint about the state of the "we" with a “charitable crumb” (Line 2). The diction—that is, the words the speaker uses—indicates that the “we” are people who need charity and food.

Maintaining the precise yet ambiguous tone, the speaker says the coffee and crumbs are “going to be served from a certain balcony” (Line 3). The breakfast will come from a specific balcony, but the speaker doesn’t clarify where this particular balcony is or why the breakfast will come from it.

The speaker says the breakfast is “like kings old, or like a miracle” (Line 4). They compare the breakfast using the word “like” to something rare and royal, so this is an example of a simile because a simile compares two things using a word like “like” or “as.” After the simile, the meticulous, descriptive tone returns. The speaker says it’s “still dark” (Line 6), and they remark how “[o]ne foot of the sun / steadied itself on a long ripple in the river” (Lines 5-6).

The speaker is a sharp observer. They notice the “first ferry of the day had just crossed the river” (Line 7). The speaker is also something of a spokesperson, as they speak for the other people waiting for breakfast: “It was so cold we hoped that the coffee / would be very hot” (Lines 8-9). Additionally, the speaker and the people hope “that the crumb / would be a loaf each / buttered, by a miracle” (Lines 10-11). The theme of anticipation and hope give these lines a wishful tone.

One hour later, at seven o'clock, “a man stepped out on the balcony” (Line 12). The tone is mysterious, as the speaker doesn’t identify the man. More so, the man acts enigmatically as he stands on the balcony “for a minute alone” (Line 13) and gazes over their “heads toward the river” (Line 14). Then a servant enters the picture and gives the man “the makings of a miracle” (Line 15), or “one lone cup of coffee / and one roll” (Lines 16-17). The man “proceeded to crumb” (Line 17) the roll, and the speaker creates an image of the man with his head “in the clouds—along with the sun” (Line 18).

The surreal imagery makes the speaker flabbergasted; their tone is startled. “Was the man crazy?” they ask (Line 19). They add, “What under the sun / was he trying to do, up there on his balcony!” (Lines 19-20). The people in the crowd don’t get what they hoped for as they only receive “one rather hard crumb” (Line 21). To demonstrate their disappointment, they flick the crumb “scornfully into the river” (Line 22). The coffee, too, is paltry, as it’s just “one drop” (Line 23); but not everyone gives up hope since some people, including the speaker, continue “waiting for the miracle” (Line 24).

“I can tell what I saw next,” says the speaker in Line 25, adopting a blunt tone, as if they were directly addressing the reader. What the speaker sees is “not a miracle” (Line 25) but a “beautiful villa” (Line 26). To describe the villa, the speaker relies on imagery—a literary device that lets the poet produce a clear picture through vivid words. The villa is “in the sun” (Line 26) and smells like “hot coffee” (Line 27). It has a “baroque white plaster balcony” (Line 28), and there are birds that “nest along the river” (Line 29). The crumb mediated the image of the villa as the speaker “saw it with one eye close to the crumb” (Line 30).

After adding to the image—there are also “galleries and marble chambers” (Line 31)—the speaker equates the crumb and the villa when they state, “My crumb / my mansion” (Lines 31-32). It’s as if the speaker says the roll crumb and lovely villa are the same, which is a puzzling statement, as a crumb is small and poor and a villa is splendid and plentiful. Adding to the bewildering tone, the speaker then says the crumb/mansion was made “by miracle” (Line 32) even though, back in Line 25, they said what they saw wasn’t a miracle. Regardless, the speaker explains how the miracle was made “through ages, by insects, birds, and the river /working the stone” (Lines 33-34). The speaker then imagines themselves on this majestic balcony “[e]very day, in the sun, at breakfast time” (Lines 34-35). In this picture, the speaker can relax with their “feet up” and enjoy the abundance or “gallons of coffee” (Line 36).

Unfortunately for the speaker, they return to reality—however surreal it appears—as they and the others “licked up the crumb and swallowed the coffee” (Line 37). The observant speaker sees that a “window across the river caught the sun / as if the miracle were working, on the wrong balcony” (Lines 38-39). The poem ends with an image of a balcony and the sun. It concludes on the intricate theme of miracles—why they occur and what they mean.