by Kierstin Bridger [easy-media med=”8426″ mark=”gallery-ArEZIg”]
The papery skin of garlic, the cloves that look like plump buds
of bittersweet-bite sink between my fingers, just air.
When I open the rest of the head I find the center

urgent with green curl, the flesh turned soft as rubber.
The yam I micro-waved for four minutes is full of fibers
the purple eyes abandoned in the disposal.  I can’t take another bite.

When is the moment winter store turns from food to new life?
All week I’ve been rescuing provisions. I cut off the tomato’s bruises,
place what remains into the blender, pulverize the fruit until it is as pink

as raw meat. I set it on simmer, forgot it for an hour, almost entirely.
if not for the hiss of gas, the piquant tang in the air, you wouldn’t be eating
the now red sauce by slotted spoon, or spilling it on the burner.

You wouldn’t notice the sweet kitchen scent turn to smoke,
the way I turned to go upstairs still hungry, still silent.
Yesterday shells and egg bits lay in waste on the floor.

You admitted to leaving the carton precariously pitched in the door.
Lunch had to wait for me to scoop yolks in my bare fist
and toss them into the trash. I remind you of this not because

we are all going to die but because we transform, love. I can’t keep feeding you
when it is so clearly spring. My car is idling in the drive.
It’s time to start a new garden, my pajamas no longer wish to sleep in the drawer.