clipped from writersalmanac.publicradio.orgFamily Garden
Tell me again about your garden
Tell me how you planted, in the small
flat of mountain land, corn seed
and bean seed, how your finger poked the soil
then you dropped in three dark bean seeds
for every yellow seed of corn.
Trees and mountains collared your land,
but the fenced garden opened freely
to sun and warm summer rains.
Your potato rows bulged in July. You ached
from digging them up, your hands down in dirt,
the cool lump of a tuber, brown-spotted,
just recovered, a greeting, like shaking hands.
Baskets full of bumpy brown potatoes filled
your basement until fall, until you gave
away what you could, throwing out the rest.
You gave away honey from the white hive too,
that box of bees beside the garden,
honey stored in Mason jars, a clearest honey
nectar from lin tree blossoms and wild flowers.
The bright taste of honey on the tongue
spoke of the place, if a place can be known
by the activity of bees and a flavor in the mouth,
if a person can be known by small acts
such as these, such as the way you rocked
summer evenings from a chair on the porch
tending your inner garden, eyes closed.
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