Beth Sherman‘s poetry has been published in Hawaii Pacific Review, Synecdoche, Lime Hawk, Rust + Moth, The Evansville Review, Stone Circle Review, Silver Birch Press, Blue River Review and elsewhere. She is also a Pushcart Prize, Best Small Fictions, and a multiple Best of the Net nominee.
Recipe for a Silent Child
Place child in a medium-size, non-stick pot.
Add water and boil. Add cabbage, barley,
cukes, diced potatoes, carrots, and onions,
Season with thyme and a dash of red pepper.
Cover and simmer on a low flame.
While you wait, break her toys, rip pages
out of her storybook. Rattle the tank so
hard her pet turtle falls off its perch
onto the plastic sundeck below.
Add turtle to the pot. Stir briskly.
Stew for 50 minutes until dissolved.
The shell makes a nice garnish.
Ignore the child’s murmurs, rusty and
sibilant, air caught in the hollows behind
her tongue, her voice like wind rubbing
against salt, that friction taking a different
shape. Someone who writes her own
book – and finally, finally lifts the lid.