“Improvised Compost” by Anastasia Stelse
All summer we tended tomatoes: staked
stalks as verdant leaves unfurled, veins
spreading into the fingertips of new growth.
We watered, fertilized, filled plots with love
tokens and improvised compost—crushed
eggshells, snippets of hair, orange peels.
When the first leaf wallpapered itself
yellow, we plucked it. Washed our hands.
But leaves kept turning, curling. We snipped
branches. I didn’t think I’d lose the plant.
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Anastasia Stelse is a native of southeastern Wisconsin, the former assistant editor for The Intentional, and a graduate from the MFA program at American University. She recently completed her PhD in creative writing at the University of Southern Mississippi’s Center for Writers. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Poet Lore, Sou’wester, New South, Fairy Tale Review, and Crab Orchard Review, among others.
