Buckets

The driver looks down at his clipboard. Seven reads normal, he says. I know, you say. He fills both buckets to the brim anyway and writes SEVEN in the margin, off the list.

You carry them up the steel stair, a bucket in each hand, and the stair rings under you. On seven you pour at the roots, a little at each plant, and the dry soil takes it as fast as you pour. You go down and back up until the driver winds in his hose and the truck pulls out. Then you carry down what is in the rain barrel on the roof. By dark your palms hold the shape of the handles.

At dawn you are on the roof. Row seven says 31 in black. Beside it is yesterday's pencil, 31. Odile rubs out the pencil and writes tomorrow's, and you do not read it over her arm.

You go down to seven. The kale has lifted on its stems, not all of it. You turn a leaf over. It is paler underneath. There is no seam.