Devouring the Peach

Cool summer spills down my daughter’s chin
and throat. All those flavonoids breaking
the blood-brain barrier. I used to buy

eight pounds from a guy with a truck,
carry them home cradled in their cardboard
beds. Sometimes, the flesh yielded,

other times, I tore it off the stone.
Sometimes, I let the sun dry the juice
on my face, other times, I wiped my mouth

hard against my sleeve without worrying
about stains. Now, I slice them neatly
with a knife. Each piece, a perfect sliver.

My daughter says she can hear me smile
even when she isn’t looking at me, something
about the saliva against my canine teeth.

She has the same sharp fangs.
The better to taste you with, we laugh.
Clingstone or freestone, the peach disappears.

But the pocked pit? There it waits,
as when the hunter cuts open the wolf,
only to find the girl, clutching her red cloak.

Author of the article

Sonya Schneider is a Northwest poet and playwright with San Diego roots. Her poems can be found or are forthcoming in Rattle, Salamander, The Penn Review, Tar River, Potomac Review, Rust & Moth, Moon City Review, Whale Road Review and elsewhere. She has been a finalist for New Letters Patricia Cleary Miller Award, Raleigh Review’s Laux Millar Poetry Prize, and Atlanta Review’s International Poetry Contest. A graduate of Stanford and Pacific University’s MFA in Poetry, she lives in Seattle with her family.