Now that the garden
has closed
with bleak of sky
and vines are gray sponges
hugging the earth
like infant children,
where store left over time?
Can it freeze with stems?
Should I stock it in the shed,
dispense it like fertilizer?
I am an empty field
before a battle
and the weeds know not to grow
because blood will rape them.
I am a pile of leaves in Fall
waiting for that final rake
to sweep me out of the air I love.
Keeping the bones busy.
This garden lives at the stretch of my palms.
It smiles in attendance of sun,
spotting first between the cracks of fence.
Poppies peak at light like
curious sea shells inspect the shore
by catching waves
but then crave the darkness
as they slip back to a salty grave.
I too slip back farther into
the house biting the cold
as it taunts me at windows
and haunts me in doorways,
viewing bitterly
my virgin plants.
What now?
Watch my green apprentice die
by the coffee table
through flaked glass?
Whisper goodbyes
and hope like a mother lioness
sending out her cubs
that I will view them in Spring?
Create something new
that these loins won't grow?
Breed life through
a cracked vein smile
and unclean gloves?
Their eyes only have courage for me.
I will take a yellow pill
with a red stifling a blue
to keep order like the garden,
kept till the surety of Winter ensues.
They will endure the snow, and wind.
They are eternity.
They will overcome the cottage,
surely take over the world,
and my grave will stay in
their presence.
Hurrying hands over empty pots
for a sufferance of thin rewards.
Silver trophy winner
Adding your comment:
Wonderfully written...bright, sharp, the real McCoy...love, lane
