Late Afternoon in April

By Diane LeBlanc

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I’m debating seedling cages for tomatoes and zinnias.
             

              Their first night in the garden is every kid’s first night
at summer camp, the air smelling like a stranger’s pillow

                            and the hole troweled into hard soil
               barely big enough for their ball of homesick roots.

A dozen hearts pulse just out of sight.

               April’s half-wrought creatures are
warming in nests. I recognize strands of the old dog’s fur,
                             last year’s abundance now gone.

Grief will swill and wolf as long as I feed it.

                 This hour is a tributary of winter’s early dark.
I take off my shoes and socks and wade in,
                              no regard for where it will empty.