During the pandemic we tore up most of our small urban backyard to build raised garden beds. Three years later, we are humbled, and learning, and have fed countless birds, insects, squirrels and our dog Bailey, who loves to eat the cherry tomatoes before we pick them.
Sometimes we feed ourselves.
Growing food never ceases to be a delight.
This spring my husband planted potatoes after several potatoes in the bin had grown eyes and roots. He shrugged and said, "Why not?" and built potato mounds in the bed next to the eggplant.
This week I harvested potatoes, twice, and wrote a poem about each journey into the earth. I noticed the line "some harvests are like that" became a chorus that reappeared in the second poem.
To all your harvests, and your birthings.
June Harvest
Some gold you dig for with hands under
the earth, the rich, warm soil heating your
palms as you follow the spread and dangle
of the roots. You comb and dig and find
underneath the small golden potatoes.
This is the first time they've seen the light –
but in your eagerness you yank them out
of their brown sleep and into the fierce
hot sun, stunned by their welcome.
Peasant food, potatoes. And yet you
could live on potatoes if you had to –
they provide every rich thing the body
needs to grow.
Some harvests are like the humble
potato. You dig through the layered
mulch and compost, the eggshells
you laid last fall and the ashes from the
too few winter fires. Then the shining
coins of harvest appear, small and round
and firm in your hands. You rejoice
in hallelujah.
Afterbirth
Last night you watched the farmer, his arm
inside the cow, up to his strong elbow, ease
the calf into the soft, warm hay. You saw
the relief in the farmer's eyes when the calf
blinked once, then twice.
You thought your harvest was complete.
But today your own arm was elbow deep
in the warm brown earth, sifting the humus
until you found the potatoes you'd missed,
tucked tight to their roots.
Some harvests are like the humble
potato: you believe the birthing is
done until another contraction opens
you. You were never told but every
year you learn:
You will be born over and over. You will
sow and reap, reap and sow. You will till
the field and put more into the ground
then you ever harvest. But each offering
of plant and vegetable will feel sweet
and solid in your hands.
Who knows what awaits in the dark.