Paintings by Drea

Beans
By Mary Oliver

They’re not like peaches or squash. Plumpness isn’t for them. They like being lean, as if for the narrow path. The beans themselves sit quietly inside their green pods. Instinctively one picks with care, never tearing down the fine vine, never not noticing their crisp bodies, or feeling their willingness for the pot, for the fire.
I have thought sometimes that something-I can’t name it-watches as I walk the rows, accepting the gift of their lives to assist mine.
I know what you think: this is foolishness. They’re only vegetables. Even the blossoms with which they begin are small and pale, hardly significant. Our hands, or minds, our feet hold more intelligence. With this I have no quarrel.
But, what about virtue?