Six heads of lettuce

I’ve never tried growing them

before, but now I’m tending

six heads of butter lettuce, 

watering and fertilizing and

tearing away dead leaves

(not too many yet) and casting

the evil eye on infernal rabbits

(a redundant phrase). 

My six heads of lettuce, soon

to be joined by six tomato plants,

are my nod in the direction 

of local agriculture; in fact,

this is about as local as you

can get: my backyard patch 

of ground 4 feet x 12 feet.

Each day, except when it rains, 

or when I forget, I fill 

my watering can like

Wendell Berry, and I bathe

my lettuces while reciting

the occasional poem. 

My timbered choir is more

like a timbered soloist, aka

the river birch sitting 

in the corner of the yard

a few feet away, dropping 

twigs and small limbs

instead of arias.

I used to work for one

of those giant behemoths

of agriculture so disdained

by Mr. Berry, but I didn’t

mind; I liked his poems

and his centeredness

in place too much. I often

told colleagues to read

his novels and poems

if they wanted to know

what the criticisms were

all about, but they didn’t

seem to mind either.

The editors of Tweetspeak Poetry are hosting a 30-Day, 30-Poem Challenge for Earth Month entitled, appropriately enough, Poetic Earth Month. Today, the featured poem is “Li Po,” and the poetry prompt is to choose a historical or modern-day figure involved with agriculture and compare yourself this figure.

Photograph by Stephanie Moody via Unsplash. Used with permission.