We came upon them nestling in the rusting bin:
six concave lumps of black loam, strange growths,
overwintered in the dark.
He would have been lifting them now,
she said. February. You need to lay them
in trays under a thin skin of soil,
until the shoots appear.
She cupped a corm in both hands.
I do not know his begonias
in this form. Only the large,
frilled heads of summer, sunburst
yellow and orange, are familiar:
the finished flower.
Now the onus is on me.
I do as she says, split and divide,
and they multiply into blooms
bright in the returning sun
and lasting light.