Cultivo

by Luisa Caycedo-Kimura

once mourning doves   made me think

of graveyards

 

today        they peck     at weed seeds

clean        my land

 

the oldest on record     lived 30 years    and 4 months

from the time          it was tagged

 

until         it was shot

how many mates           did it mourn

 

American toads       breed

at the neighbor’s pond

 

I wring       laundry     to hang     on a clothesline

mostly black

 

when I was eight

a man trapped me    in the stairwell

 

to our New York        apartment

the note from his pocket     loose-leaf cutout

 

blue ink print      said I was       beautiful

a scalpel      in his pocket

 

how many      would die

in a war        without weapons

 

I was born        in the middle

of an Andean hurricane     the first time

 

I saw mamá      her blue eyes

reflected green            from the flame

 

of a candle    the last time   in Florida

her eyes         were shut

 

yesterday       Aaron and I      planned

a garden         for our new         Connecticut home

 

asparagus and blueberries can’t be harvested

for two years

 

seeds must avoid      hickory taproots

cilantro      has to be        direct seeded

 

doesn’t like       to be moved

my older sister bought           her first house

 

after med school

lived there               twenty years

 

before renting it out            I’ve moved

twenty times       from rental to rental

 

clouds dissipate        on our ridge

we buy spades      trowels

 

pruners         window sheers

fog on the trees        lingers

 

coats        the open grass

droplets      vaporize       burn the fog

 

how does one quench         an instinct

to bolt

 

Copyright 2021 Luisa Caycedo-Kimura

From All Were Limones (The Word Works, 2025); originally published in Shennandoah, Spring 2021

Used by permission of the author.