In Short –  Issue 2 (Winter 2025)

January 31, 2025

Ducks9 by KJ Hannah Greenberg

Sippy Cups

By Vani Kannan

The child teaches himself to step over the raised threshold of the doorway. In the yard, he sifts dirt from the fallow tomato plants; pulls dried thyme from stiff stems; grabs each dandelion flower, letting them fall to the grass. A CDC handout advises me to keep doors shut and sweep our windowsills for dust, which may contain lead. In the neighborhood to the north, built on a Superfund site, a lead-testing worker gets fired, refusing to call its high levels “normal.” Parents give children sippy cups of soda because they don’t trust the water. The soda company buys rivers and universities. When the child’s pediatrician tests his blood and the results are “normal,” I do not ask for details. At home, he pulls up handfuls of grass and hands them to me; pinches a pod and brings it toward his mouth; picks up a stick and runs with arms outstretched; chirps over magnolias shaken to life by spring. A gardener cautions me not to plant until after Easter; to not be fooled into following the rhythm of the closest star.

Vani Kannan (she/they) is an Atlanta-based writer and Associate Teaching Professor in the Emory University Writing Program. Her journalism and creative work appear in publications including Mobius: The Journal of Social Change, The Revealer, National Catholic Reporter, and Alba: A Journal of Short Poetry.