“It is better to conquer our grief than to deceive it.” Seneca
*
At dawn our crew punches in
to gut out the same day,
another yard, another birth
of deluge pushing from below.
We split the green membrane
down to the marl of earth
tunneling out the turf.
A cold silence sears in me.
The fertile May sun blossoms
above an aged cherry tree.
Dirt clumps in roots like the clench
of small pained fists. The hours breed
our pace as we trench down
to the depth of the burst line.
**
It is mercy that pipe lies deeper
than a child’s grave, a memory
never spoken of. Already
our muscles feel a good day’s work.
The backhoe comes later,
then the smell—wet soil and worms—
hidden within the cut.
The air rings with crow caws.
I drop down the ladder
to fix one seepage in the world.
My skull sunk far below grass,
its thoughts sew in soil like seeds
sprouting hopeless tendrils to dig
into this uterine mud.
***
Filled by dusk, a small scar
mars the perfect yard, yet
every job is just a planting—
each mind roots where each falls.
The days form a forest
that leafs out a fresh life.
Morning finds the same hole
in loam of the next lawn.
Daily I rise broken
to fill the hole of myself,
and bleed salt to salve my cuts.
“Today is still its own good life.”
Dirt, sweat, day, dark, water, bread.
Somehow, this is all of it.