Rooftop Greenhouse at 4 A.M.

On the hospital roof, the greenhouse hums like a cello. Condensation beads along the glass, a second Milky Way. Below, ambulances stitch white thread through the avenues. Above, basil leaves lift their palms to the sodium moon.

I water trays of seedlings with a dented copper can; each pour is a soft percussion on dark, breathing soil. Tomatoes carry green lanterns under their furred skins, and mint releases cold sparks whenever my sleeve brushes by.

At 4:17, the city exhales from a thousand vents. Steam rises and braids itself with the pepper vines. In the ICU windows, night nurses trade tired constellations; here, marigolds keep manufacturing small suns for morning.

When dawn unlatches, the panes blush from iron to honey. Pigeons land like punctuation on the gutter's edge. I pocket the smell of wet earth before the day turns loud, and send one ripe strawberry down in the service elevator.