Today's Specials

Sara Ries Dziekonski worked for years as a waitress in her parents' Woodlawn Diner in Buffalo, New York. Her poems take readers into this world of service and the friendships that develop between customers and those who are feeding them. Today's Specials was named a runner-up by Tom Lombardo for the 2024 Press 53 Award for Poetry. Lombardo said of this collection, "[Sara Ries Dziekonski] unveils truths of a family-run restaurant from the other side of your diner dinner plate. I could smell the food buried in the tension. The pace, the teamwork, the interaction with customers, both good and bad, become a solid core of the poet's diner-sized revelations. Her poems made me hungry for more."