Underpass Garden

At the belly of the overpass, rain keeps a second calendar. Moss writes soft alphabets on concrete ribs. A grocery cart holds dark soil, warm as bread. We kneel beside headlights that pass like distant fish.

Someone threads tomato vines through rusted chain-link, their tendrils tuning themselves to truck-thunder. Coins of water tremble on each leaf, and the air tastes of iron, basil, and summer brakes.

At midnight the city exhales from manhole mouths; steam climbs and wraps the stems in ghost-cloth. We lift small lanterns made from pickle jars, watching bees sleep inside flowers folded shut.

By August, red fruit hangs where noise once lived alone. Children carry them home in their shirt fronts. Even the pillars seem less certain of their weight, as if roots have taught stone how to listen.