No one showed you how to plant the peas
deep in the soil—it must have been something

you slept through—but your helping hand wedged
the chicken wire around the perimeter to fend off

deer and critters eager to stain their teeth
and fill their bellies. You watched them grow

from the back porch, their purple hulls
you could almost spot from your bedroom window

and if curiosity overcame you, your flashlight’s
beam seemed to make them more majestic

at midnight, right before sunrise, moments
in between. When it came time to pluck them,

there were too many to carry on your own.
The neighbor girl saw you struggling, so

she hopped the fence and grabbed a spare basket,
started picking peas herself. Mother never was

home, so the shucking you normally performed
alone. Neighbor girl, her name was Danielle,

sat next to you on the floor dying her hands
just like yours, pulling pea after pea from its pod

and tossing shell after shell into an old wood bucket.
Her skin smelled like dandelions, her hair like

a fistfull of honeysuckle. You wanted to touch it, you
wanted to drink from a strand and see if some sweet

scent stuck to your tongue. When you thumbed
through shells for stray peas she knew you were stalling.

When she traced her name on your neck you knew
she wasn’t leaving. Your carpet burns itched

for days, your jaw ached from kissing until dawn,
your arms and legs and stomach and shoulders and everywhere

turned purple from her hard-working hands. It was
the only summer she haunted the garden, your body,

before she moved off and became a myth. So many
rows of corn, armfuls of tomatoes, enough squash

to fill a wheelbarrow but she only harvested the peas.
Maybe she wanted something to stain you.

Years later and you can’t touch the slender
pod without remembering, you can’t scrub the purple

residue from your hands without first wanting to rub
your neck raw with it—leaving a blurred lilac bruise—

or wanting to write her name someplace no one
would ever see.