poem: Before the Frost
Before the frost,
scheduled for tomorrow night
after a salaciously warm Autumn --
so much so that bulbs that shouldn't rouse
till Spring are everywhere 4 inches tall --
I pull the tomatoes up by the roots,
shaking the soil from the matted balls,
trimming each tiny green fruit into a bowl
where it may, with the warmth of the season's
first furnace run, ripen.
Before the frost, up early with time-shift,
out in the garden, rain in tiny droplets
scattering cool welcome,
I plant bulbs to over-winter in the ground:
hyacinth, tulip, and crocus to amuse,
onions and garlic in the loosened soil
of the wrenched tomatoes, blossoms still on the vine.
And seeds, the sturdy greens: parsley, kale, and lettuce,
and black ones for leeks, though it may have been too late.
Before the frost, my kitchen full of green tomatoes,
the volunteer avocado tree in a little pot inside,
the mint taken in as well (it will last a month more
before it dies), and the aroma of broth, cooked with the last
of the summer herbs.
I've been dreaming, first of passages, narrow and unclear,
then of being full with child, not memory but expectation.
These are the months, now, of such things.
Of some things wrenched, still living, their roots disturbed.
Of others, finding purchase in the loosened and disrupted soil.
Outside, as I wait within, a cold and sustaining rain.
scheduled for tomorrow night
after a salaciously warm Autumn --
so much so that bulbs that shouldn't rouse
till Spring are everywhere 4 inches tall --
I pull the tomatoes up by the roots,
shaking the soil from the matted balls,
trimming each tiny green fruit into a bowl
where it may, with the warmth of the season's
first furnace run, ripen.
Before the frost, up early with time-shift,
out in the garden, rain in tiny droplets
scattering cool welcome,
I plant bulbs to over-winter in the ground:
hyacinth, tulip, and crocus to amuse,
onions and garlic in the loosened soil
of the wrenched tomatoes, blossoms still on the vine.
And seeds, the sturdy greens: parsley, kale, and lettuce,
and black ones for leeks, though it may have been too late.
Before the frost, my kitchen full of green tomatoes,
the volunteer avocado tree in a little pot inside,
the mint taken in as well (it will last a month more
before it dies), and the aroma of broth, cooked with the last
of the summer herbs.
I've been dreaming, first of passages, narrow and unclear,
then of being full with child, not memory but expectation.
These are the months, now, of such things.
Of some things wrenched, still living, their roots disturbed.
Of others, finding purchase in the loosened and disrupted soil.
Outside, as I wait within, a cold and sustaining rain.