Category: Issue 18 – 2025

by Melissa Whiteford St. Clair

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She said, “Grits, I hate ‘em.”

The woman who’s battered copies of Bon Appetit magazine were just that, battered.
The dog-eared pages of juice cum wine-stained publications stacked on bookshelves
with the most favored recipes floating to the top of the pile.
Classic and contemporary dishes curated for cocktail parties and folded into family
dinners alike.
Presented to the table with pomp and circumstance ceremony.
Cue Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture in the background on the HiFi
The meager-budgeted, eager-to-please daughter-in-law offered up to this
Julia Child incarnate who ran her kitchen helping hands like U.S. military KP duty.
Hands that wanted to chop and dice and mince and squeeze fresh lemons for the finish
~ grits, as in shrimp-n-grits,
a Southern American staple this military spouse learned to finesse
doing time at duty stations in the Carolinas.
An entrée she supped on nightly her first trip to the west coast to San Diego.
With one wave of her well-manicured hands sheltered inside Playtex rubber gloves
which went straight to each jump rope toned hip, striking an indignant pose,
one expertly tweezed eyebrow raised, and plainly stated, “Grits, I hate ‘em,” then
properly went back to separating chicken wings into drums and flaps.
Her doe-eyed son’s wife crushed like the clove of garlic pulverized under the weight of
the chef’s knife for the teriyaki sauce.

Nor could she stomach the texture of its semolina cousin, couscous.

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Founder of White Girl Advocacy, Melissa Whiteford St. Clair is a poet and social justice advocate. She shares her message of unity and creativity through interactive advocacy workshops, antiracism efforts, poetry readings, and talks. Melissa has published two books of poetry and a self-guided workbook. She is a contributing poet to the “South Carolina Bards Poetry Anthology” 2023, 2024, 2025. Her poem “Harriet’s Feat to Freedom” was selected for the Hilton Head Island Poetry Trail at Mitchelville. She was honored to be part of the Piccolo Spoleto Sundown Poetry Series in 2025. 

by Richard Allen Taylor

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Twelve-piece family meal, I blurt from my driver’s seat
toward the metallic croak of the order-taker’s voice.

A bad decision, made under duress of hunger,
condemns me to three, maybe four days

of fried chicken, enough to feed a family of six
in one sitting. Living alone, I will have my fill

of this savory standard of Southern cuisine
on Friday, then sate my flagging urge for the leftovers

no later than Saturday. By Sunday, the fridge will open
to cold bird, hacked to death, not in traditional

breasts, thighs, drumsticks, and wings, but into
unappetizing, unrecognizable shapes, not at all the way

Mom cut up her chickens. The once-crispy milk-battered
skin, having locked in the grease, will tempt me to convert

to vegetarianism. I should have seen this coming before
the cashier shoved that big cardboard box into my window

and gave it an extra push to get it past my face, too late
to change the order to two-piece dinner, please.

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Richard Allen Taylor is the author of four poetry collections including Letters to Karen Carpenter and Other Poems (2023) from Main Street Rag Publishing Company. His poems, articles and reviews have appeared in many publications including Aeolian Harp, Flying South, Litmosphere, Pinesong, Tar River Poetry, Rattle, and Sheila-Na-Gig Online, among others. Several of his poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. A former review editor for The Main Street Rag,  and founding co-editor of Kakalak Anthology of Poetry and Art,  Taylor earned an MFA in Creative Writing from Queens University of Charlotte and currently resides in Greer, South Carolina. 

by Jennifer Weiss

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Inspired by A Man Milling Cacao into Chocolate with a Metate and a Mano, by unidentified Spanish artist, circa 1680-1780 (NC Museum of Art Collection)

---

You kneel at the altar of your work, roll up pristine sleeves,
power granite mano back and forth across metate
to crush cacao to bitter powder you blend with sugar,
fashion into oval candy for clergy, nobility, royalty.

At drizzly dusk you lumber home, the fragrant dust
of labor etched in calluses and countenance.
Your woman smiles, nods from the hearth where she stirs
a stew of onions, cabbage and potatoes for supper.

Across the darkened room, your babies slumber.
You crouch behind a curtain, trace beloved lips
with work-worn fingers, sample mounded breasts
more luscious than any confection consumed at court.

Rolling together, two become one; the patter and hum
of rain rinse away the grinding day with rhythmic thrum.

---

Jennifer Weiss was awarded the 2022 NC State Poetry Prize. Her work has been featured in the NC Poetry Society Poetry in Plain Sight series and in Qu Literary Magazine, The NC Literary Review, Kakalak and The Main Street Rag. A lawyer and former state legislator, she volunteers in a Title I Elementary School and loves reading aloud to children. She lives in Cary, NC. Read more of her poetry at jenniferweisspoetry.com.