Instead she perched for nineteen years
on top of the refrigerator, staring at the bubbles
in the pot, the salt shaker, the forks she lined out
belly up between exams. Her skin was never very bad
but spotted dry and begging for a tender hand
or peeler. She was always at the windowsill, dependable
as a cellar full of spuds.
She cooked a lot of quiche and spinach pie
wild rice, kebobs, and salads like the Christmas mornings
which we envied over chocolate gelt. Her mother’s recipes.
Before work in the kitchen. After work in the kitchen,
books full of ligaments and numbers crying meek
meanwhile into the windowless upstairs of night.
Then one day when my father left the table
and later the house, without a bite
she pulled the toothpicks from her ribs
gathered her wet roots from the jar
and made a go of open air, just light and what
she’d stored inside. Shoots sprouted wild as tantrums.
I wonder how the tuber learns that it no longer
needs the leaves. Sometimes to grow
you have to core out every eye but one.
