Kitchen Talk

I still remember the laughter and noisy talk emanating from the kitchen in my parents' home. I could hardly wait to be "grown" and invited into my mother's kitchen. Graduating to the kitchen from the kids' table at holidays was a milestone marker, a rite of passage from girlhood to womanhood. All that talk 'bout everything and everybody (in the kitchen) was where I wanted to be.
Kitchen Talk takes us back to the heart of the home and the joyful moments where everything happens. Created, written, and shared by and for women, it reminds us of the "homemade love" stirred up in the kitchen. Whether gathering with a hot comb, making tortillas by hand, or preparing a kosher meal, women of every race, culture, and faith have always shared stories in the kitchen. I hope every woman who reads this poem will see herself as she laughs out loud and remembers her own Big Mama, Bubee, Granny, Nana, or Meemaw.
While Kitchen Talk collects voices from the past, present, and imagined future, it also invites you to share your own. It reminds us to gain strength from the women we know, to talk things out with love, and to learn from one another. Read it out loud, share it with your sisters, laugh and cry together. Embrace the rhythm and rhyme, sing if you wish, and dance if you dare. I trust that it will move you beyond the kitchen to tell your own stories and pass on the homemade love.