Alicia Lee
a place has a taste. it can be acrid or bitter, fringed
with city lights and tumbleweed exhaust
or soft in the mouth like overripe pear
baked into cinnamon suburban sidewalks
but here, it aerates with earth and chlorophyll
our vein creeks tongue lap ancient stones
dissolving minerals into playgrounds
of pavements and petrichor. the winters here
are ice wine, frozen on the vine and patient
and we love the buzzing summers of gnats
that leave fumes of bug death in our accustomed
nostrils. each tasting note pairs us with here
the olfactory manufacturing bouquets of
the ripe currants that grew by the farm house door
and the sweet, hot manure we welcome
with new cows and reliable old pastures
About the author
Alicia Lee is a Wisconsin-based poet and certified sommelier. She was recently awarded first place in the 2026 Lakefly Writing Contest. Her work is featured or forthcoming in Slipstream, Whimperbang, One Art, Eunoia Review, Creative Wisconsin, Mobius, and Trashlight Press. A contributor to the Voices of Neighbors anthology and the People’s Museum of Prince, she studied creative writing and wine in Washington state. She now focuses her work on her connection to the terroir of the Midwest.