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I think of how to write a poem: the object (or action) as symbolic, the carrot standing for something like determination, or gardening as representative of procreation, of seeding, of seedlings, of the weeds that grow around our hips.

I think of how his hands work: the grasp of beer, that slick casing, the pull of round root.

I could write a poem about carrots, about the way we pulled harvest from the garden this weekend: the mixing bowl of sunflower seeds, the wet carrots in the sink, and at night, boiling the chicken carcass in the copper pot, later, weeding out the bones, the way the gristle and strange lumps of meat (I think back to childhood) mixed with carrots and onion and celery (I think back to childhood in Tennessee, sitting, folded legs, on the floor), now part of an array of glass jars (I think back to that dinner of the art teacher, her husband), the covers now bulging, now burst from over-exertion (I think of the husband, schizophrenic, who made us dinner, my family, my father, the professor), but for winter, so much stored (I think of the gristle on my plate, how I thought I could catch it, schizophrenia, how to want it, how not to).

I could write a poem about those slim orange pieces, the carrots, the first from the garden, the cake we might make in a week or two.

Or, it could be a love poem: one to this one, the partner of over nine years, the one whose hand I hold beneath wool blankets, the one who parses his work day (oh, workaholic husband) in wee bits to attend events, the one who cheers me on, quietly, stubbornly--and this, the love song, the one I write to you when you are asleep.