If all our eyes had the clarity of apples …
–from Bernadette Mayer’s, “The Garden”
If all our eyes had the clarity of apples, if all our thoughts
were as sharp as a pineapple’s bracts. If all our bitterness
could be finely minced, thrown into a pot with the softening
yams, the small white beans. Add a little thyme, both dried and doused
with rain, add a tablespoon of basil; let the flavors marry and meld,
let the steam fog the kitchen windows, loosen November’s chill.
If all our children reseeded like volunteer tomatoes. If grief loosened
with a tug like the late fall carrots from the weedy patch out back.