In the yellow kitchen, the cabbage is boiling. The pot is black where flames have bruised it. A woman is wearing a bib apron, her hair pulled back with bobby pins. The rubber ends are missing. They scrape her scalp when she sticks them in. Once she used to pin curl her hair before going dancing at the Bernardston Inn. Once she used to sing It Had To Be You. And then it was him. And then, five children wailing and burping and spitting up on her apron – the canvas one with the tie-on straps that harness her to the kitchen. She reaches for the ladle, thinking about the sheets, wet and clumped up in the washing machine. And then later, when her husband comes home, his silhouette dark and sullen beneath the covers, the whiskey breath that will make her gag and turn away. Now she’s turning the hamburgers. The sizzle and spit sting her wrists. She wipes the grease on her apron, adding to the pigments of beets, pureed peas, and the swollen buds of Brussels sprouts that no one would ever touch.

Sweet, evocative, haunting: Delight in 19 poems to please every palate.

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Five local artists, a variety of media, and new insights into our world. Enjoy the unique visions of these extraordinary women.

Savor the poetry and prose of five talented young authors whose voices you will want to hear again and again.

Meet the 25 authors and 5 artists whose voices and visions enliven the fifth edition of our journal.