She planted pennies near the roots of her trees
in every corner of her yard
for strength, for strength
even though the practice could not be verified
to hold truth, to help growth
not even under scientific scrutiny could we
prove it would do no harm.
Columbia lies supine
take the coins from her eyes and
hold them on your tongue like communion.
The land we live on is lush
our trees grow, the bits of metal
underneath irrelevant as superstition
we have good soil, plenty of water.
Do you dream of water, asks my horoscope?
Pay attention to how it flows but beware.
I stress caution, caution: do not follow.
My husband, as a child, visited relatives
who fed him bald, white potatoes from a can:
for koach, for koach, begged him
to eat more and there is the time
and place where he fainted in the heat
on the ball field, after a summer holding
candles up to quail eggs, measuring
growth of the embryonic birds in their shells
day by day by day turned data.
The coin in my mouth begins to bleed
a taste I know better than change.
Can we buy strength? What is strength?
Whatever we knew in the old country
we are made of this new dirt now;
I swallow red clay like prayers
dug up in daily portions with a silver demitasse
to root us and our children
deep to where the water sinks.
In the sea, what has sunk
will rise in time, will float
when it is no longer heavier than its surroundings.
