She drags her rusty kneeler as way opens
amid plants knee high, wetting her blue
trousers in dew, as clouds decide
to open or not, as the morning star
recedes and hides itself, with a sliver
of new moon, in day. Poppies
have not yet awakened, nor daisies.
She kneels and kneels again, eyeing
potato vines, chard, kale, spinach, beets
to see are they hiding pretenders beneath
their skirts: thistle, geranium, nipplewort,
even nascent blackberries, ash trees, an oak.
Most of all, she seeks out bindweed, a long
vine snaking from place to place, climbing,
smothering fruitful things. She knows
she's prejudiced, but her rationale is:
She went to fight bindweed
among cabbages, peas,
borage, arugula,
potatoes, raspberries
and such. Distracted by
thistles, as they are more
easily removed, she
worked an hour, then eased
ponderously into
her cracked resin chair, out
of breath, watching two goldfinches
having it out
on a mossy fence post.
What is not said in six
syllables is silence.
The cool-weather plants have bolted, and she
Has had to gather the saddest cases.
Even kale, not last year's but this year's, and
Chard are defying the routine she has,
Over decades, established as garden law.
Often she walks through now, knife in hand,
Lopping flowering stalks, vainly trying
Whether some leaves can be kept soft
Even as the heat chases her dream of spring
Away again. Like last year. Like the year before.
There's something to be said for radishes,
Her bowl tells her, which is that it is not
Empty. With arugula and rocket, leaves
Ripped from already woody stems, snipped,
Piled loosely, steamed lightly, stirred
Lazily with duck egg on hot iron
How she knows she is not useless yet:
Old cornstalks must be shattered right
Where they stood green, to feed worms
She knows are waiting in darkness.
Her hens wait too, for water, for feed,
Especially for deadnettles, nipplewort,
Kale and comfrey. Some hummingbirds
Now arriving check the lilac for their
Own nectar bottle that hung there
While last spring, summer and fall
Slipped past. There are wasp queens
She finds sleeping in her woodpile;
Her heart skips a beat as she sees
Each one, for she fears them, yet
Interests herself in their rest and
Safety, for the good they do her garden.
Spring springs upon her unawares;
Perhaps she thought snow would drift
Right up to her window, as it should
In February, as in her memory
No such month escaped some white.
Going forth in a sleeveless shift
She pockets up seeds for flats,
Pulls out dank bins of soil,
Reaches for small pots, sets hope
In light. Such April ploys are
Not to be counted on, she knows --
Guessing random frosts
Still may spring upon her unawares.
It begins with mare's tails: wisps of ice
That spread, ghostly fingers from
Beyond the southwestern horizon; her
Ears feel the chill as she is planting bulbs.
"Go inside," her chapped hands urge her,
"Inside, your steaming kettle waits."
"Not yet," she replies. In her mind's eye
She watches thousands of daffodils bloom
Where grass grew. She must plant hundreds
If her dream will breathe. Altocumulus,
Those clouds like schools of fish, arrive.
Her hands are hurting her now; cold clay
Milking moisture from gapped skin.
As she bends, shovel in one hand,
Round brown balls of life in the other,
Each destined for a hole along her fence,
That time when there is yet nothing,
Her skills being at rest, synchronized
And sympathetic with soil's sleep --
Timid buds of lilac or jonquil still
Tucked within themselves -- she wonders
If she's even a subsistence woman, is
Mistaken in that as so much else, as when
Even deep snow cannot efface what
Winter erases when it is nearest spring.
Her hands stretch to packaged seeds;
Enter into bargains with their quietude.
Now? Now? Now? Now? she asks them,
Though she knows they will not move.
Here by a cold window she spreads
Envelopes on her table: peas, beets.
Radishes will be first, nearest the house.
This time of year that room is not much visited.
Its herringbone-patterned floor of worn bricks
tilts here and there where rodents have made inroads.
Homemade flats lie heaped in corners; stacks of cells
lean sleepily together; insulation dangles;
tools hang, festooned with webs and dust. Sometimes
when the door has been set ajar, a towhee wanders in,
becomes confused at light from so many windows,
beats itself silly, then rests, is eventually found
and shown the way out. There's not much
an old lady can do but wait, watching for
earlier suns to rise, for petrichor,
for that sudden dislocation brought on
by stepping into sunshine by a southern wall.
Then, after one jonquil blooms by way of
Beets are a thing, she mused; all summer
Every seed she'd planted out refused
Every opportunity to sprout, but
Those in flats thrived, just as those
Seedsmen told her they would not.
As for after they were transplanted, well!
Rare was the beet that was not found by gophers.
Even so, some were left not quite finished
As the gophers waddled away, and
Those she was grateful for. She brought in
Her greens; made wilted salad; then
In winter came across again the muddy half-moons.
Nothing is better than gifted beetroot steamed,
Gopher bitten, she told herself, or otherwise.
What to do with leaves, if one cannot leave them
Here beneath aspen, gum, maple and birch
As what they become in winter, a kind of skirt
To warm and feed fanned roots, is gather and
Toss them on a garden. She spreads hers
Over bed and path alike, with straw, with
Dead grass and weeds, barn bedding, the contents
Of kitchen bucket and tumble barrel, along
With any foliage that comes to hand, even prunings
If too small to bother with for her iron stove.
This is for worms and all their small companions
Heaving aside the earth of path and bed alike,
Leveling and loosening, making untilled tilth.
Evening comes and she stills, listening
As the city of humus thrums toward spring.
The rhythm of the work is to set down
Her padded bench, a flat, and trowel at the
End of a bed and drop as if in prayer,
Reach for the trowel (bent for her old
Hand at right angles), dig, then grope for a pot.
You may see each hole is deep and wide enough
To exactly take the root ball. She carefully
Holds this in her shade, tips the damp
Mass in, packs with trowel, repeats all -- three
Or four times -- then stands. Behind her, some
Four plants glow green in any six feet of bed.
The rhythm of this work, when best, resembles
How monks or nuns in supplication glide
Easily to the floor, centered, unconcerned
With body or mind, then rise, then glide again,
Outcomes not sought, nor merit earned.
Rattling around in her potting shed once
she came across packets five years old;
had not heart to toss the things away.
Popping the lid from an empty parsley shaker,
she tipped the packets’ contents in and stirred.
Ten flats she sowed at random with this mix,
come March, that first year; a month earlier
thereafter, as springs grew warmer. Bits of green
appeared, some here, more there. She'd prick out any
that went to a second pair of leaves, and give them
each its own square pot. What might they be?
Some Red Russian, curly or Lacinato
kale, some radishes, turnips, beets. Six kinds
of lettuce, collards, cabbage -- Dutch or red --
some spinach, also chard. Carrots, kohlrabi