On Mulching Tomatoes and Saying Goodbye

Today we said goodbye to Maryam, Mohammed, Wali, Radi, Ahmed, and Ibrahim, a wonderful Sudanese family who have become friends and brothers to so many here during their two months with us. Their door was always open and usually some warm cake and a glass of tea would be in front of you before you even realized you might someday be hungry or thirsty again. Their mother, Maryiam is a beautician by trade and, before she left, she took it upon herself to adorn the hands of every willing woman at Jubilee with intricate henna designs as a way to say thank you. Just for the record, each hand took her an average of 4-6 minutes to complete. Here are some pictures of the results:

And, in case you are interested, here is a poem I scratched out later today as I thought about mulching and swimming, saying goodbye and other events and conversations from the day:

Thoughts On Mulching a Tomato Patch

for the Barakat family

The importance of laying enough paper--

first on top of the leaning oats, just so--

and then spreading (not-too-thick) the

mulch cannot be overstated. Neither can

the importance of sunscreen and boots

to discourage fire ants and sometimes

the perfect straw hat. Also, of course,

break at 10:30 for the kind of cookies

where you can see all the ingredients:

a pecan half, a few rolled oats, the flour

milled this morning and a little rendered

lard to hold it together like the good life.

Sometimes goodbyes are clear and neat

as garden rows: leave one, start another

and never look back until after it rains hard.

To say goodbye to this place is to find

yourself in a new country, altogether

limbless, memories holding on like

salvation. Today we made a circle

of hands and sang and said thank you

in broken languages and held eachother

like the longer we stood together the

more inseparable we could become.

They looked their best-dressed, headed

to the city where their hearts were set

before they even touched land or thought

of leaving home. This place was a detour

and now, another homeland lost and tears

flowed like streams down their cheeks.

Moo Paw, who lived here years ago, said it

is always like this. You never forget the

Jubilee waters: the surface of the ponds like

glass, the love here tangible and edible, and

the welcome holding close like none they

had seen in years of scorched, torched forests

and fields and farmers and friends.

Now, they joke that a day without rice is

no day at all, and I could laugh, really, if it didn’t

still carry the scent of smoke from the camps

where their dreams lay dormant for years.

It is no act of these hands, this kindness

that makes another day possible and

allows the broken to be pieced together again

into a scared and thoughtful whole beneath

the sweet gum and briar and whispering pines.

It is no one or force or power or wisdom

but the steady compelling beat of taking

the longest possible way home if it means

we get to hold hands the whole way.

It is waiting to plant the tomatoes until

the mulching is done and waiting for

mulching until the mowing is done and waiting

for mowing until the sun comes out and

perhaps, most days, you could call it all

naïve. But I tremble with each new sunrise,

each spring, each tomato that bursts and

nourishes in the presence of such

unshakable hope. After all of this, after another

warm day I slip down to the ponds and slide

in like a turtle. The water is clear and soothes

across the surface. I float and breathe

and practice holding on, moving, letting go.

Holding on, moving, letting go.