They should, yeah. She examines the tray, gives it a shake and another gust of wind.  We can head in.

Then Rhoda will check whether Pradnakt would like her to carry the tray before heading inside again - slightly subdued from the conversation, but still eager for the next bit.

She carries it herself, likewise subdued.

The next step is usually roasting them, she continues once they're back inside, to give them a little more flavor, but I'm not sure which way you'll like better. The ones from the cupboard are roasted, though; try one of these and see which you prefer.

She tries one, taking time to actually think about it. ...I think I prefer them roasted? she offers.

All right. She demonstrates the right settings for the oven: It's easy to burn them, so be careful not to set it too high. They'll take about half an hour.

She listens carefully to the instructions and nods her understanding. What do we do while we wait? she asks, almost shyly.

I could recite some poetry, if you like.

Rhoda looks down, smiling shyly. I would like that.

She grins and nods, retrieves a datapad from the back, and then starts, eyes closed, sending the meanings alongside the spoken words -

From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward  
signs painted Peaches.

From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.

O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into  
the round jubilance of peach.

There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.

[source]

Rhoda smiles more, perching on the edge of one of the benches, swaying slightly with the rhythm of the recitation. She doesn't necessarily understand the words - there's definitely missing context - but it makes her feel...something, something pleasant,

Yeah, good.

One of my wishes is that those dark trees,
So old and firm they scarcely show the breeze,
Were not, as 'twere, the merest mask of gloom,
But stretched away unto the edge of doom.

I should not be withheld but that some day
into their vastness I should steal away,
Fearless of ever finding open land,
or highway where the slow wheel pours the sand.

I do not see why I should e'er turn back,
Or those should not set forth upon my track
To overtake me, who should miss me here
And long to know if still I held them dear.

They would not find me changed from him they knew--
Only more sure of all I though was true.

[source]

That hits something. She can't identify exactly what, but she feels the words. Like they fit with her somehow. It's a slightly heady, disorienting sensation, identifying that much with something. (It's another new sensation to add to the list.)

Mmhmm. How about this one, then:

In the hot afternoon
In the burned meadow
The brook is only a dampness
Blood on the dry white stones

In the hot afternoon
In the hillside pasture
Climb where the April torrent poured
There is life beyond

The broken fence, in the locust grove
There is water standing in pools
And a kingfisher sleeping over
The minnows trapped for his feast

The walls draw closer, now, and over rock
Somewhere is the sound of trickling water -

The banks are steeper - climbing -
The shade is deeper - stumbling -
The pools are deeper - climbing -
And here at last they are empty of minnows
See in their depths the arrowlike shadows of trout

In the hot afternoon, from the burned meadow
Climb from the hillside pasture, the locust grove
Climb to find water, stumbling into the gorge
Climbing beyond to the vine-entangled swamp

Where the cat-briars hide the brook that is deep and cold
And the trout have their sunless kingdom, climb
Stumble and climb for the source of it all is here

Here, the final and secret pool
With green scum at the edge of it
A cloud of midges over it
And bubbling from the depths of it
Stirring the frogs' eggs and the fishes' eggs
Here, the source, the limpid and living water
Rising from white sand.

[source]

That doesn't get quite as strong a reaction - there's more missing context - but she still seems to enjoy it. (And there's curiosity about the things she's missing context for, and below that, an anticipation that she might actually be allowed to learn that context.)

We'll have to go on a trip sometime, let you see some places that aren't desert.

That gets warring thoughts of 'Yes please' and 'That sounds like it would be an inconvenience', and eventually manages to settle on 'This is something I would like if it's not a problem, please, thank you'. (And a slight smile once she's managed to reach that point.)

It'll take some setting up, unless we want to leave Daisy behind to mind the place. But someday, she grins.

Another poem?

She ignores the slightly panicked feeling (although there's a thought about not wanting to leave Daisy behind), and focuses instead on the the idea of more poetry.

Please?

Mmhmm.

        Over the frozen snow
    With a musical swish we go;
Never a planet that rolls in space
Doth travel more smoothly his destined race
    Or less of the earth doth know.

        Covered all carking care,
    With a robe of the frost-work fair;
We are the creatures of joy today,
As free as the feathers that round us play,
    The flakes of the crystal air.

        Swimming the wind are we,
    Like the fish in the buoyant sea;
Never a gambol in deepest ocean
Could equal our subtle delight of motion,
    Nor thrill with a purer glee.

        Clouds overhead, you say?
    And a glooming of ashen grey?
Let it come down on us, swift and strong,
The morrow be dreary, and dark, and long -
    It cannot destroy this day.

[source]

More swaying and smiling at the pretty words. (And if she happens to be picking up some of the words translate to because of the repetition, Pradnakt wouldn't be doing this if she thought that was a problem.)

Aww.

Okay, one more, she sends, and then goes a little serious. I'm not sure you'll like this one, or be comfortable with it yet, but I feel like it's important for you to hear it anyway. Just - so you know that it's a thing that can be.

She tilts her head, not entirely sure of the change of mood. She doesn't quite nod, but she doesn't shake her head either, and sits waiting instead. (Partially, this is because she knows better than to argue, partially it is honest curiosity.)

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
’Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
’Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.

Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

[source]

Pradnakt wasn't wrong. The words make Rhoda shift uncomfortably, looking away, and wrapping her arms around herself. It feels simultaneously too close to her experience, and too far away.

A shiver runs through her, and she bites at her lip. She feels, she thinks, altogether too unsettled for what she's pretty sure was supposed to be a hopeful poem. But Pradnakt had said she might not be comfortable, might not like it, so it can't be wrong to feel like this. (Unless this was meant as some kind of punish- which doesn't make any sense, even to Rhoda, not really, not given the words, even if she can't quite assimilate them yet.)

Sigh. It's not a punishment. It's - there's a path there, there's a trail, it's a way you can be; you're not ready yet, but I don't want you to miss it because you didn't know.