No Matter the Manure

Early in the morning, you hear things.
The creak of your chair.
The robin building her nest on the back porch.
The wind, slight as it is.
The slight catch in your wife’s voice

as we talk about our time,
locked together by law not once
but now twice,
as if our soul connection was somehow
not enough,

the answer to that age-old question,
who would you want to be stranded on an island with
is suddenly more real than ever,
as is the answer.

Early in the morning,
you hear things.
Love in her voice.
The coffeemaker dripping predictably,
likely the only thing that is.
The cat purrs in the next room.

There is mayhem out there. Confusion. Fear.
You fear for your children. For your friends.
For a nation in unexplored territory
still playing by old rules,
but not here.

Here there is fresh coffee.
Conversation with the one you love,
far more of it than life normally allows.
Love is allowed to bloom anew
no matter the manure it is planted in.

About this poem

Making the most of being held in place by inclination and law. Worried about my children and all the people I know and love. Living my time in our house glad to be with the woman I love in a time like this.

It’s manure season here in Vermont. The farmers are spreading it on the fields for fertilizer. Some work the virus cannot stop.

Despite the madness, spring is almost here.

From all these things, this morning’s poem.

Tom