“Peaches”- by Sreya Sanyal

---

My mother cuts a peach over the sink,

turning the knife against the pit until

the flesh comes loose in pieces. Outside,

the sprinkler ticks across the neighbor's lawn

and turns the afternoon briefly silver.

She gives me the better half, the one

without the bruise, and stands there eating

hers over the open drain. I am seventeen

and cannot remember the last time

I let her feed me anything. The juice

runs down my wrist, gathers in the small

crease of my elbow. She reaches for a towel

but I tell her it's alright. In the window

above us, the two of us are caught

in the same square of light, her hand

still lifted, mine already turning away.

---