J.S. Bach

She turned up the weeds without pity, spreading their roots before the sun. Most of them died, though a few tenacious grasses rolled over when she was not looking, and sucked earth till she found them skulking about, and banished them to the heap with the egg shells and old tea leaves.

Returning to the scene of the massacre, she placed a five-tined fork before her, pointed toward the earth's core. On its step she placed her boot's sole, and drove its teeth home, tearing living soil. She did this many times, and in her hearing, the dark loam whispered in protest. But what was she to do? One must eat, and the white seeds in their packet were waiting for the sun.

She carried a blue denim bag at her side, zippered it open, feeling about in its depths like the housewife at the station platform seeking her ticket for the last train -- Seizing her prize, she held it in a soiled palm, reading the runes of inscription: "Date of last frost"; "zone three," "days to maturity." How many days now to her own maturity? Not to be thought of. Her hand trembled. Tearing the thin paper rind, she tipped out contents: a shirtfront of buttons. Five seeds to a hill she counted, pinching their graves over them: three hills.

And on to other tasks. The rainmaker whispered over hilled earth all the zone's days to maturity, and the date of first frost held true. Almost forgotten in the rush of gathering in others: beans and corn, tomatoes-- she sought them last in October, the golden fruits of that planting. Her other crops talk to her; the Hubbards never do. (What are they dreaming at, over there? She brings out the knife.)

Now it is March, she remembers having gathered the silent, sulking Hubbards. How are they faring? A look into the pantry reveals them, dour and uncommunicative, all huddled like bollards on the high shelf. She chooses one to halve on the kitchen block. Scooping out seeds to dry and roast later, she bakes the halves till soft, slipping off skins per Rombauer & Becker. "Dice them, and in a mixing bowl add butter, brown sugar, salt, ginger, and move the lot to the mixer, remembering to add milk." With a bowl of silent Hubbard thus richly dressed, she goes to the living room, asking blessing of the gods of the steel fork and the weeds, the rainmaker, the packet of white seeds, booted foot and blue denim bag and the longtime summer sun, eating, listening to a fugue by J. S. Bach.