It’s the way their pixel hands never shake

lifting parsnips from the uncomplicated soil—
how the worms stand on their heads
as the screen’s cool rinse coats the room–
digital anesthetic. 
 
This is how I fish now: through a window
inside a window. The harvest is always
ripe on time. No rot. No bugs. No 
blight. I’ve forgotten the weight 
of a real hoe, the heft
of a watering can slung on a shoulder
like a handbag.
 
Outside, somewhere,
a car door slams. A voice rises, falls.
I used to know the texture of voices—
and they could cut like wire. Now, I prefer
this silence: the soft plink of coins
stacked in a virtual mason jar,
the animated cow lowing 
as if on cue.
 
What is it about watching them
gift a jar of jam to indifferent neighbors,
then stand there, swaying
in the code-made breeze?
 
No risk of a mouth twisting
at the wrong moment. No eyes
glazing over when I go on 
and on mid-sentence.
Here, the only body that tires
is mine—this slow house
of breath. I save 
the game. They save it for me.
 
The farm will thrive in perpetual spring.
My hands will hover over keys. 
This is the pact: I will trade in bits
for this kind of peace—
the tidy rows, the calendar of rain,
the quiet machine hum
 
that never asks me to explain
why I’ve gone so long
without planting anything.