Making Soup by Steve Klepetar

My aunt opened the window.
She leaned out into the cool air.
The kitchen sink was filled with bones.

She sighed and washed them,
rubbing each one smooth and clean.
I assumed she was making soup,
because there were onions
in a bowl, carrots carefully scraped.

I wanted to help, so she let me
hold the mesh as she poured hot broth.
It splashed and burned my hands,
but just a little, and I would not cry.

My cousins told me secrets about her soup,
how it made their eyes glow,
how they could leap across the pond.
My uncle broke a baguette with his rough hands.
We ate, tongues blazing in our astonished mouths.



Steve Klepetar lives in the Berkshires in Massachusetts. His work has appeared widely and has received several nominations for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. He is the author of fourteen poetry collections, including Family Reunion, The Li Bo Poems, and A Landscape in Hell.