Ariga: Visions: Poetry: Keeping the same hearts by Beth Laura O'Leary

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Keeping the same hearts

By Beth Laura O'Leary

I like these misshapen vegetables
I can find in the back of the vegetable bin
the ones with a little gray mold
and soft sides and bruises
but whose hearts are still good.

I am like my grandmother
pulling the last of the potatoes
from the dank wooden boxes in the cellar in Sweden
finding gnarled pimpled stones
for dinner in spring
the hungry season
before something green or
even alive has come up
before they have stuck the cow's neck vein
for a little warm and salty blood
collected in the pail to drink.

I tear the roots sprouting vainly
toward the refrigerator light
struggling along
trying to reproduce
despite the odds.

I cut each soft dark spot out
at last
in the center
a perfect sweet spot
the cubic inch
of blessing.

Beth Laura O'Leary is an anthropologist at New Mexico State University. You can write to her at boleary@NMSU.Edu