After Ada Limon
By AIDAN COOPER
It’s asparagus season,
posters in Hadley & Northampton
for asparagus soups & sauté,
the annual festival on the 6th, $1.99 a bouquet
at Grady’s to a dollar more from Flayvors
& for the adventurous
there’s asparagus ice cream to taste.
I don’t know how asparagus grows.
I buckle into my mysteries like belts.
Sometimes I’m asked
why I love the rural life,
& I don’t. I just have a need
to point at earth. Because to say,
watch yourself, &,
asparagus could happen anywhere
& has always meant to,
is to say, all that’s ever done is a delight
we don’t dare explain. Today
everything’s fuzzy with fruition &
I don’t shave my whiskers. Today,
someone big strokes their asparagus beard
& next season’s strawberries bulge
like puckered lips. Oh, you, the valley
is saying. You’re here to be kissed
& happy & made of time.
Writer | Aidan Cooper ’26 | acooper26@amherst.edu
Editor | Ira Buch ’29 | ibuch29@amherst.edu