The author layers horse manure with grass clippings, used shavings and garden debris. The manure and fresh grass clippings are rich in nitrogen and the shavings and dried garden debris add carbon. Although the ideal carbon to nitrogen ratio is said to be about 30:1, the author has been successful with a wider range of carbon to nitrogen levels.

“The compost pile is a site of transformation, taking what has been cast off and returning it to the garden…We are all candidates for composting. So we cannot approach the compost heap without a feeling of connection.”

— Stanley Kunitz, “The Wild Braid: A Poet Reflects on a Century in the Garden” (2005)

Stanley Kunitz was not the first, or the last, poet to articulate humanity’s connection to compost. In 1867, Walt Whitman wrote in “This Compost” that “It gives such divine materials to men, and accepts such leavings from them at last.” In 2018, poet Laura Grace Weldon told us in “Compost Happens” that just as “broccoli stems and bruised apples” are transmuted, “Surely, our shame and sorrow also return, composted by years into something generative as wisdom.”

I, too, feel connected to my compost pile:

There’s the daily visit with the wheelbarrow heaped high with manure.

My horse thinks I’ve stolen something precious (he’s right),

and immediately poops another steaming pile — so there!

So, there is the nitrogen, elixir of lush, vibrant plants,

precious to people for digesting food, and the promise of growing up.

There’s the weekly pilgrimage with my offering of dried-up weeds and flowers.

I’ve robbed them from the garden, but the garden makes more — so there!

So, there is the carbon that builds structure in the compost, as it does in human cells.

Energy releases as carbonic matter breaks down: compost heats up; people garden, dance,

and burn fossils that cannot be replaced.

There’s watering the mound when it becomes dry. No rain for months — so there!

So, there I provide the shower (for now) with my coil of hose and make rainbows

with my back to the glaring sun.

Bacteria and fungi don’t have legs; they swim through the compost to their next meal.

Human cells need water, too; yet, like soil microorganisms, we drown from excess.

There’s turning the compost pile with my pitchfork — one, two, three, heave-ho!

My arms and my back are not what they once were — so there!

So, there is the oxygen all living things must have to go about the busyness of breathing,

except anaerobic bacteria. Their calling card is the stink of making friends in low places.

Four, five, six, heave-ho! Aching arms and back be damned — so there!