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.