It’s time to put up the garden–canning, preserving, freezing. Of course, I hated it when I was a kid, but now I wish I had the time and cellar space to preserve summer in a Mason jar. Not to mention family close enough to gather on the porch to string beans, pare apples, shuck corn, and talk the day away.
 
THE RHYTHM OF STRING BEANS
A lapful of green
sprung from deepspring furrows.
Hands nip, twist,
neatly string beans.
Droning voices
of women working
swell in noontime sun,
drive worn hands
as they strip strings.
Garden rows stretch
fruitless, toward tomorrow.
Narrow with distance,
look like creases
in work-worn hands
holding strung beans.
Crows circle, cackle,
follow the same path
through turquoise sky,
swirl into whirls
on the tips of fingers
that still string beans.
Fruit of the earth
weighs down
women’s skirts.