Susan Tepper is the author of eight published books of fiction and poetry. Her most recent book is a funky road novel titled “What Drives Men” that has made the final list at American Book Fest Best Book Awards. Other honors and awards include eighteen Pushcart Nominations, a Pulitzer Prize Nomination for the novel “What May Have Been” (Cervena Barva Press, and currently being adapted for the stage), NPR’s Selected Shorts Series, Second Place Winner in Story/South Million Writers Award, Best Story of 17 Years of Vestal Review, Shortlisted 7th in the Zoetrope Novel Contest (2003), Best of the Net and more. Tepper is a native New Yorker.

Beggar’s Soup

The old bird is cut up
to put in the beggar’s soup.
Deliver my name in vain.
Blood and a bit of celery
add flavor to the stock.
I recall flying low
over a bright beach
following the shoreline.
It was a cascade of
party boats dotted with
a few trawlers.
Here and there house boats
with chairs outside.