Dawn Doran and Caroline Crawford

Hope is a Tomato
By Dawn Doran
Acrylic, gold leaf and mixed media on canvas and nature
Painted using Caroline Crawford’s poem (below) as inspiration

Home Grown
By Caroline Crawford

Open up.
It’s been a long time.
Now surrender yourself to
the sweet, the sour, the juice, the meat
of this tomato
and  remember why you wait
dismiss without even picking up
the rotten tomatoes of November
the cold-storage tomatoes of January the anemic tomatoes of February
the mealy tomatoes from too-far-away of March
the picked-too-soon tomatoes of May
remember why
you grow your own
choose your seed
plant it
water it
wait for it to sprout
watch it, fret over it, breathe a sigh of relief when the green appears,
let it grow
on its own and with help, and support, and attention, yes,
but pick a good seed, and a good tomato knows how to grow itself
a good tomato knows it’s a good tomato when it’s in that seed
it knows that in time, with patience, it’s going to be
big, red, round, soft, firm, tender, juicy
it’s going to make you sigh and say
yes, there’s nothing better
yes, that’s what I want
that’s what I waited for
that’s why I don’t buy tomatoes why I wait.
Taste this tomato and remember
what a tomato is supposed to be
something worth waiting for
something worth savoring something to celebrate while the juice is dripping down your arm
it’s your dirt,  your  rain,  your patience, your summer,
it’s hope come to fruition,
it’s love, it’s life.

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A Midsummer Life’s Dream
By Dawn Doran
Inspiration Piece provided to Caroline Crawford

Planted
By Caroline Crawford
Response to Dawn Doran’s painting (above)

In the silty, shale-riddled Chemung County soil, John Perry walked quietly, pulling with deep appreciation on his fifth Camel of the morning. The warm, humid air wasn’t hindering his cigarette’s companionship of glowing ember and curling smoke. It was the only company he wanted as he contemplated the garden’s progress today.

But at the edge of the garden–his garden, he thought emphatically– Mandy and Carrie were rearranging the stones that he had carefully set out to rebuild a portion of the stone wall. He turned around and frowned down at them. “Hey you two. Cut that out.”

John turned back to the neat row of onions making their way through the pebbly soil and starting to wave their tufted tops toward the sun. Things were coming along nicely. The tomatoes were keeping to their cages, their green knobby fruits hanging dutifully on their leafy vines. The pole beans wound their way up the poles, and despite a few japanese beetles, the were going to give him a bountiful crop. The beets…

“Pepa! Pepa! We found a bunny!”

John pulled again on the tiny end of the Camel, placed it on a small slice of shale and neatly stubbed it out with his moccassin. “A bunny. A rabbit?” he said distractedly. “Those rabbits will eat my cabbages. Darned rabbits.”

“Pepa, it’s just a baby! Come see!”

A baby rabbit. “That rabbit’s not going to stand a chance with two kids like you chasing after it,” he said with a short, dry chuckle. “How about you come up here and get some work done?” He’d go see the rabbit, then see if he could get the girls to pick some weeds like Caroline suggested that they do. He felt around his pocket for a new Camel, lit it in one swift motion, and walked slowly down the hill.

“Oh, Pepa, you scared him away!” Carrie pouted. The tiny bunny, sensing his motion, bounded into the hedges. Carrie quickly brightened again. “Come on, Mandy, let’s get back to our game.” Carrie was older than her cousin Mandy by two years and liked the chance to be in charge when they were together. Their summers visiting their grandparents in Elmira got both the girls out of their urban neighborhoods and into the fields and woods where their mothers, and grandmothers, and great-grandmothers had grown up.  What most people in New York State, both residents and out-of-towners, knew as yet another slightly depressed, post-agronomy town was to John’s down-state dwelling grandchildren an oasis in their otherwise concrete-gridded lives.

John looked at the two girls, wondering if they reminded him of their mothers at that age. He shook off the question–it wasn’t easy remembering 35 years earlier, and the memories he had were of the office, the sales calls, the secretary who smelled so good when she brought him his coffee, just the way he always liked it. He’d left raising the family to Caroline, who seemed to have managed just fine.

He heard Carrie shouting to him as she ran down a row of snap peas, “Pepa! This is our fairy farm!” Mandy piped in, “We’re growing fairy food, Pepa! We’re growing magic sugar plants! Carrie is the fairy queen and she tells me what we’re going to eat and what we’re going to feed to our gnome friends! See those Pepa?” she said, pointing to the slanting towers of pole beans. “Those are our fairy houses!”

“Queen Verdana summons you!” Carrie yelled to Mandy, and they ducked under the pole beans.

“Hey, now,” John said quietly, flicking some ash to the ground. “Stay out of those beans. If you’re going to be in the garden, you can weed.” It was a pointless request, and he knew it. There were never any weeds left after his daily inspection of his perfectly straight green lines of beet tops and balls of cabbage and clusters of peas and onions and eruptions of zucchini.

But still. A garden’s not to play in. A garden is a process one sets in motion, keeps in motion and then stops when it’s produced what it was meant to produce.  Then he and Caroline–Carrie’s namesake–would blanch and boil and stew and can for days on end, the steaming kitchen ensuring pickles and dill beans on the coldest winter days. Even now, looking at the cabbages, he could taste the sauerkraut Caroline would be setting out on their table in his mother’s old cut-glass dish.

“Time to go home, girls,” he said. “I’m done for the day and there’s nothing here for  you to do.”

“But Queen Verdana…” shouted Mandy from under the beans.

“You heard me,” he said, blowing a long smoke trail. “I’m sure your grandmother has something waiting for you to do back at the house.

He strode ahead, toying with his cigarette, wondering if the field needed mowing. The girls held back, walking slowly, smelling the smoke intermingling with the scent of earth and vegetables, grass and summer sky, up the well-worn path to the house, staying out of his sight and smiling at each other as they nibbled on the bunch of young green beans that they’d plucked from the vines.