Fairmont, WV,

The garden glowed all summer, green
flames jagging out in the leaves
of zucchini, the icon hearts
of Kentucky wonders, the lace
of tomatoes.  And a miscalculated spark
from a weeding hoe or a neighbor’s
cigarette butt set it afire.  Perhaps
it was a chunk of coal missed
when we picked them from Monongah topsoil
hauled in, ignited into a smolder
like the seam in the Dakota Badlands
or up the road in someone’s backyard
in Morgantown.  Perhaps our hillside
had finally eroded down to the Monongahela
enough to bare a vein where we had tilled
and plotted our garden, telling us
we should build a tipple rather than
cultivate okra and squash.  And perhaps
it was just the sun
urging all that ancient flora
into blazing blooms once again.