A Summer Kitchen

The stillness of time alone in a summer kitchen,
time given to the grace of preparing cool foods for sharing,
soothes my being,  my humid thinking,
my heat thickened body that turns 
toward the herb-clean subtlety passing through 
on air that also holds birdsong in its breath…

Basil and chickadee,  blue jay and lemon thyme;
the cedar waxwing and purple finch, the scapes and the pea blossoms:

an afternoon’s lullaby for the senses,
woven with cilantro and threads the colour of the purple iris 
that remind me of crisp sheets and a nighttime
that smells of warm honeysuckle and moon.

Kimberly M. King