It’s not even 20 degrees outside, but I’m sprouting a sweet potato vine on the kitchen windowsill. By the time Spring is really here, I should have a hearty vine that I can keep rooting from cuttings. And then I can hang the vines in a basket outside my window. If I keep rooting the cuttings, I can hang a basket indoors all year.
I need something to plan toward, look forward to — something other than the solitude of a long cold winter.
Views
All kitchens should have windows
double wide, Windexed clear
if not into sunny vistas at least
into frames of sky
beyond a stand of trees bordered
by day lilies in clumps, maybe
a lilac bush or two, certainly
a bird feeder busy with wings and
morning light. Not to mention a deep
indoor sill where seeds sprout green
even when winter shrouds the pane.
(elf 2003)