Compost Notes from the Commune

Today we turned the soil and found someone’s ring, polished like river glass, worn by the years we no longer owe to anyone.

Sophie says the carrots taste different when grown beside garlic. Emma insists we plant basil only on the north side of the wall where the shade clings longer. We don’t argue. We listen.

Once, this place was a parking lot. I remember the oil-laced water pooling near the gutters, how nothing bloomed except silence and sirens.

Now, even the compost steams with intention. We know every layer by name, scraps, peels, coffee grounds, the partly-read manifesto left by someone who traded books for bees.

When the sun cracks the cloud-blanket, the panels shimmer like fish turning upstream, and the tomatoes lean in, wanting more.

This is the r-evolution: worm bins, gray water, broken things mended until they forget they were ever broken.

We end each day with hands too full for fists.