fallow ovenbird I dream as if Steinbeck were authoring the chapters–a fallow field sucked dry by the avarice of sun, my mother and I perched on a tractor dragging an ineffective plough through clods of desiccated earth that fly into clouds of dust. Our lungs are stripped of moisture by a hungry hot wind. And soon, through delirium or a shift in the tectonic plates of reality, the field becomes steeper until it's nearly vertical. My mother is ahead of me, having abandoned the tractor. She makes quick progress on foot, but I am floundering, gripping ropes and chains embedded in the crumbling soil, failing to haul the weight of my body upwards. Each step sends my leg into silken silt all the way up to my knee. But just when a fall seems inevitable I find myself perched on the velvet lap of an ornate seat in the Orpheum theatre waiting to see the symphony perform Mahler. My children are with me and they won’t get through without snacks. To this end I have lugged along a harvest box from a local farm, filled to the brim with produce. The man in front of me had the same idea and is happily nibbling on a raw onion. Bits of translucent skin fall to the ground at his feet while I offer my children hunks of cabbage and microgreens. The days slide between famine and abundance. I try to convince myself I have enough (my pockets are full of radishes, sweet and spicy) but after so many years of being last to the table I tremble with desire at the thought of everything I’ve never had the chance to taste. 260206 what's it to you? who go blather from