I want a life as full as a fat July tomato, its shiny taut flesh splitting when freed from the vine, spilling in syrupy rivulets down my arm. I want summer camp and tanned limbs and towheaded children that plunge fearlessly into the lake. I want to wear matching sweaters with my sisters.

I want blackberry stained fingers and long cricket-chirping nights and trees so tall I can’t see their tops. I want to know the name of every little flower that quivers in mountain meadows. I want cannonballs and dripping popsicles from the corner store and kids so tired at the end of the day they collapse in their spaghetti. 

I want a neighborhood packed with my siblings and grandparents down the road and family dinner every Sunday night. I want to love my husband fiercely. I want Saturday morning pancakes and a book with my name on the cover. 

I want shoulders to cry on and long walks and Christmas puppies with red bows around their necks. I want to hold things up to the light and consider them carefully. I want to drink wine barefoot in new grass and my prayers to sound like birdsong.

Maybe I am asking for too much. Maybe I am asking for too little.

I do not know how long the vine of my life is, or how much fruit it may bear.

I only want to leave the world with a garden picked clean.