A Gardener’s Rounds
The fence around my garden protects the snake on the compost pile coiled for warmth the toad shaded under leaves of chard the voles whose delicate feet have trampled a warren of slim paths through beds of clover and it protects the voles’ burrows under punk logs that secure the fence.
Tight-lipped seeds do not disclose their fanciful designs until the day when the hull splits unfurling bouquets of ideas–– roots and stems leaves toothed lobed ovate or basal and breath all the soaking funneling and excreting of liquids of light and gases that culminates in abundant tight-lipped seeds.
A plant suffering from disease or exposure to cold wind poison drought or standing water begins to decay quietly starting at hairline roots and the tips of leaves–– little by little it fades it dies back diminishing until it puts an end to a plant’s suffering.
Alive in the ground ubiquitous fungi twist and coil themselves around capillary roots anticipating a banquet of protein and sugar in turn they offer gifts nitrogen phosphorus then set themselves up to protect the host from invading pathogens alive in the ground.
Death is likely to find them so it’s a miracle on this summer morning when bees heavily coated with pollen tumble blossom to blossom–– they’ll fly off in the fall they’ll brave frigid air wind and snow huddled together to emerge in the spring queenly when blooms are sparse and death likely.
Why don’t you come with me on mulched paths we’ll pull some carrots browse the tomatoes dill and parsley–– a garden is not wild but it makes you feel wilder it’s not a closed circuit but it persists and the more you nurture the soil the more you nurture yourself so why don’t you.
LEONORE HILDEBRANDT is the author of the poetry collections The Work at Hand, The Next Unknown, and Where You Happen to Be. Read more.