the soil beneath your fingers

and here in the winter sun and the August wind which today is gentle, you are seeking more gentleness, gazing at the sprigs of lavender and the tuber leaves extending their tendrils from the damp soil and

though the arugula has gone to seed before its time and the terracotta planters are cracking at the edges, the yuccas are still reaching-

this is a planet of reaching-

and here in this nation of fire and flood and medicationtokeepmovingmovingthemachine

you are scanning for kindness, and you’re not fit to be around people today, not fit for anything but staring and scribbling

calloused fingers moving through a medicated mind, and you can press word to page, soil into pot, metal string to note and your fingers are moving and

your eyes, they’re scanning for kindness

beyond your medicated mind and beneath your fallow fingers you are searching

for signs, for earth speak to whisper,

rest child,

here, here in the dirt, amongst the trellis of youthful climbing peas and purple lettuce gone to seed,

there is softness here,

there is beauty here in the breaking and the reaching and the dying and the living

look child,

the soil beneath your fingers is nothing but kind.