“Things Every Southern Woman Should Know How to Make”

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Alice clicked on the headline, mildly curious about what yet another stranger thought should be in her kitchen repertoire. Pictures of China plates mounded with crispy fried chicken, greens, cobbler, and a pile of biscuits a mile high flooded the screen, all set off with a pitcher of sweet tea beaded with condensation. The table was set; an apron draped off to the side next to a box labeled “Gramma’s Recipes” in fine calligraphy. She closed the browser and put away her tablet. She was born a Georgia peach, but she couldn’t make a cobbler to save her life. Did that mean she wasn’t southern? Or maybe just not “Southern.” For Alice, there was no recipe box full of family traditions. Her younger years were filled with rental homes in different states and her father’s voice coaxing her toward a text book rather than a cookbook. Metalworking and fabrication held more interest than learning to flambé or sauté. Did it make her less of a woman that her cooking skills consisted of fresh salads...
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Poetry: All's Lost


His form, silhouetted against the red sky
Held a sense of defeat.
Slump shoulder posture,
His outstretched hands, pleading.


Glints of fire far from his reach
reminded him of his solitude
On a hilltop won by no one;
the child’s body lay at his feet.


Why?
His voice echoed across
the land and in his mind.
Blind eyes returned the question,
burning through his soul with
accusation.


Purple sky sparkling with white ice,
the vapor of his breath the only
sign of the living here.
Still he sought an answer
A lone figure against the night
Blotting out stars,
Stained blade in his hands.


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