Harvesting the Lavender

When the lavender dies in the winter storm
you strip the dried leaves from their stems.
The pall of their aroma stains your fingers
as you open a drawer, looking for
an envelope. You think you’ll mail them
to a friend. But you smile when you see
the address written across the front:
Montana Department of Revenue. You
dream of sending scented leaves
with your tax return, picture the look
on the face of the clerk who opens the flap,
reading your note: I’m sending you
my portion of the income I grew on Texas soil.
You like to imagine that the lavender leaves
can do as much for Montana as the dollars
and cents printed on your check. You see
a new mountain road in her future, poured
pavement to a rural school, a bike path
where children ride their bikes in
the early morning light. There’s fresh
concrete and alongside, lavender fronds
waving their hands in the summer wind.

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Karly Randolph Pitman is a writer, teacher, facilitator and mental health trainer who brings understanding to sugar addiction, overeating and other ways we care for trauma. You can find her poetry at O Nobly Born, a reader supported newsletter, and her healing work with food at her substack, When Food is Your Mother. She lives in Austin, Texas where she does as much as possible with her hands and is writing a book on overcoming food suffering.